(RSF/IFEX) – Reporters Without Borders has called for the release of Al-Jazeera TV’s Cairo bureau chief, Hussein Abdel Ghani, who was arrested on 27 April 2006 for broadcasting “false information likely to harm the country’s reputation.” Detained in the resort town of Dahab, where he went to cover the Sinai bombings of the past few […]
(RSF/IFEX) – Reporters Without Borders has called for the release of Al-Jazeera TV’s Cairo bureau chief, Hussein Abdel Ghani, who was arrested on 27 April 2006 for broadcasting “false information likely to harm the country’s reputation.” Detained in the resort town of Dahab, where he went to cover the Sinai bombings of the past few days, he was taken to Cairo for questioning by state security investigators.
“We call for the withdrawal of all the charges against Ghani,” Reporters Without Borders said. “He made a mistake but he recognised it immediately and it does not justify his arrest. We also question the methods used by the police – denying him access to a lawyer, taking him away by force, and subjecting him to a long interrogation before locking him in a cell.”
Arrested at Dahab’s Novotel hotel, Ghani was initially taken to the local police station before being transferred to the office of the state security prosecutor in Cairo, where he was questioned at length without being allowed to contact his lawyer, family or employers.
Prior to his arrest, Ghani reported on Al-Jazeera on 27 April that there had been an attack against policemen in the town of Al-Sharkiya, east of Cairo. The information was mistaken, and Al-Jazeera issued a formal retraction a few hours later. Several other Arab TV stations also issued similar erroneous reports about an attack in Al-Sharkiya without being bothered by the security services.
Contacted by Reporters Without Borders, the Egyptian press union condemned Ghani’s arrest as a “serious press freedom violation.”
Ghani is currently being held in an individual cell in Al Nozha prison in Heliopolis, east of Cairo. He has been Al-Jazeera’s Cairo bureau chief ever since the Qatar-based TV network was created in 1996.
