Egyptian Bar & HR Entities Declared the Egyptian Alignment for Supporting the ICC
On Thursday, January 3, 2008, the Egyptian human rights organizations held a meeting in the lawyers club in Cairo along with the committee of liberties of the bar association. The meeting concluded with the importance of establishing an Egyptian alignment including the civil society institutions to urge the Egyptian government to join the international criminal court. Also, the meeting stressed on the role of Egyptian civil society institutions in highlighting the role of the court in settling the principle of international justice in the world and how useful it is for the Arabian and international peoples. The Egyptian government played an outstanding role in supporting establishing the international criminal court. But, this role was set back after the Egyptian government signed a bilateral agreement with the American government regarding abandoning extraditing criminals to the court. The agreement is an obvious violation against settling the justice and in the same time it supports impunity. On another hand, the participants in the alignment called the Egyptian government to abandon this agreement, and to act like democratic countries in supporting the court despite the American severe opposition.
The Egyptian civil society institutions assured that they will spare no effort to join thousands of Arabian and international civil society organizations to support the court and to make Egypt join the Rome statute. This comes as a stance for supporting the people’s right to punish whoever practices any violations against humanity allover the world.
It was noticeable that the Egyptian civil society institutions worked on not only joining the alignment, but also joining the secretariat which will be responsible for setting up a plan for highlighting the role of the court and establishing a national debate about it along with holding workshops to support the court. The Arab world refrained from signing and joining the Rome statute. Only three Arabian countries “ Jordan , Djibouti , and Comoros ” out of 105 Arabian countries joined the statute.
The Egyptian alignment for the international criminal court welcomes all civil society and human rights organizations in Egypt as members in the alignment. Also, the alignment welcomes any kind of cooperation and experience exchange with national and international alignments supporting the court.
The participants agreed on making the committee of liberties in the Egyptian bar association, the alignment general coordinator and its headquarter besides supporting law experts joining.
The alignment secretariat will hold its first meeting next days to set up a plan for actual activity.
The alignment includes :
committee of liberties in bar association Mahmoud Kandil (human rights expert)
The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information
The Egyptian observatory for justice and law
The Egyptian organization for human rights
Nadeem Center for Psychological Therapy and Rehabilitation of the Victims of Violenc
The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights
The Association for Human Rights and Legal Aid
Al Naqeeb organization for democracy training and support
Egyptian woman issues organization
The South Centre for Human Rights
Hisham Mubarak law center
The Egyptian association against torture
the Arab program for human rights activists
Land Centre for Human Rights
Habi Centre for Environmental Rights
The Civil Observatory Society for Human Rights
The Egyptian Centre for Human Rights
Andalus Institute for Tolerance and Anti-violence Studies
The Coordination Committee for Rights and Union and Workers" Freedoms
The Dialogue Society for Development and Human Rights
The Egyptian Association for Community Participation Enhancement
Maat Centre for Legal and Constitutional Studies
The Arab Organization for Supporting the Civil Society and Human Rights
The association of freedom of thought and expression
The Egyptian Association for the Support of Democratic Development
Freedom Centre for Political Rights and Democratic Support
The Egyptian association for economic and social rights
The Awn Society for Human Rights
The national center for human rights
Al Haq center for democracy and human rights
The association of absolute justice
The Arab council for fair trail support