A file photo of the Cairo demonstration

NEW YORK,  November 7 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The New York-based Human Rights Watch scolded Egypt’s security forces over the use of excessive force against hundreds of demonstrators who were protesting the U.S.-led war on fellow Arab country Iraq in March.

In a report issued Friday, November 7, the watchdog documented "excessive use of force in dispersing demonstrators and bystanders on March 21 in violation of the right to freedom of assembly; arbitrary arrest and detention, including of children; beating and mistreatments of persons in detention, in some cases amounting to torture."

Joe Stork, acting executive director of the HRW Middle East and North Africa division, said "plainclothes officers viciously attacked protestors with pipes and clubs, and arrested demonstrators and bystanders without cause.

"Then the jailers beat those they considered to be the ringleaders," he asserted.

On March 21, a massive but largely peaceful public protest turned bloody after security forces attacked demonstrators in and around Cairo's Tahrir Square.

Later the same day, plainclothes security forces attacked a peaceful sit-in at the headquarters of the Egyptian Bar Association, where they beat and arrested a number of defense lawyers and two members of parliament.

"The government should make public the names of these security officials who were responsible for ordering, carrying out or condoning these attacks," Stork said.

Anti-war demonstrations and rallies swept most Arab and Western capitals alike before and immediately after the unleashing of the Anglo-American invasion of oil-rich Iraq.

Demonstrations are effectively prohibited in Egypt, under emergency laws in force since 1981.

Probe

Some 800 demonstrators, including at last six children, were nabbed by security officers and often detained in unsuitable places, said the HRW 40-page report.

It added that although most of the detainees were released within 24 hours, 61 were held for investigation and charged with destruction of property, promoting disorder and other offenses.

The human rights watch maintained that other activists and demonstration leaders were unlawfully detained in the following weeks for their "known or alleged affiliations with organizations critical of government policies rather than on evidence supporting the criminal charges eventually brought against them."

The arrests that occurred in the days following the protests were "without judicial warrants, in violation of Egyptian law," according to the HRW report.

The advocacy group called on the Egyptian government to "conduct a prompt, impartial inquiry into serious allegations" of rights violations by its security forces during the protests.

"The government has an obligation to carry out an impartial inquiry and hold accountable those responsible for this brutal behavior," Stork said.

The watch-dog also lashed out at Egyptian authorities for failing to "provide medical care to seriously injured detainees."

It recalled requesting meetings with and sending letters of concern to Interior Minister Habib al-Adli and General Prosecutor Maher Abdul Wahed, but never received an answer.

Outgoing State Information Service head Nabil Osman had brushed off the torture reports as "hearsay ... mere claims made to further the interests of anti-government political factions."

On Monday, November 4, a member of the banned but tolerated Muslim Brotherhood opposition movement died while in police custody.

The independent Egyptian Human Rights Organization said the hospital report had mentioned several injuries on Sayed Mohammed Kotb's body and pressed the government "to take the necessary steps to stop the practice of torture."