May, 25 2016, 04:15pm EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7413 5566,After hours: +44 7778 472 126,Email:,press@amnesty.org
EU: Halt Arms Transfers to Egypt to Stop Fuelling Killings and Torture
Almost half of European Union (EU) member states have flouted an EU-wide suspension on arms transfers to Egypt, risking complicity in a wave of unlawful killings, enforced disappearances and torture, Amnesty International said today.
Despite the suspension imposed after hundreds of protesters were killed in a show of grossly excessive force by security forces in August 2013, 12 out of 28 EU member states have remained among Egypt's main suppliers of arms and policing equipment. It is feared that EU Foreign Ministers could soon decide to scrap the current, already insufficient, suspension.
"Almost three years on from the mass killings that led the EU to call on its member states to halt arms transfers to Egypt, the human rights situation has actually deteriorated," said Magdalena Mughrabi, interim Deputy Middle East and North Africa Programme Director at Amnesty International.
Almost three years on from the mass killings that led the EU to call on its member states to halt arms transfers to Egypt, the human rights situation has actually deteriorated.Magdalena Mughrabi, interim Deputy Middle East and North Africa Programme Director at Amnesty International
"Internal repression by the security forces remains rife, and there has been virtually no accountability. Excessive use of force, mass arbitrary arrests, torture, and enforced disappearances having become a part of the security forces' modus operandi.
"EU states transferring arms and policing equipment to Egyptian forces carrying out enforced disappearances, torture and arbitrary arrests on a mass scale are acting recklessly and are risking complicity in these serious violations."
EU complicity in repression
In 2014 alone, EU states authorized 290 licences for military equipment to Egypt, totalling more than EUR6 billion (US$6.77). The items have included: small arms, light weapons and ammunition; armoured vehicles; military helicopters; heavier weapons for use in counter-terrorism and military operations; and surveillance technology.
The EU countries who have been supplying arms to Egypt through exports or brokering since 2013 are: Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Spain and the UK.
EU states transferring arms and policing equipment to Egyptian forces carrying out enforced disappearances, torture and arbitrary arrests on a mass scale are acting recklessly and are risking complicity in these serious violations.Magdalena Mughrabi
According to Privacy International, companies from several EU countries, including Germany, Italy and the UK, have also supplied the Egyptian authorities with sophisticated equipment or technologies destined for use in state surveillance, which Amnesty International fears may be used to suppress peaceful dissent and violate the right to privacy.
Egypt's violent crackdown on dissent
In recent years, the Egyptian authorities have presided over a crackdown under the guise of restoring stability in the country after the military ousted President Mohammed Morsi in July 2013. Heavy-handed measuresincluding the use of arbitrary and excessive force with firearms, armoured vehicles and other equipment, have resulted in the unlawful killing of hundreds of protesters. Thousands more people have been arrested and faced mass trials which are grossly unfair. Detainees have routinely reported torture and other ill-treatment.
The security forces have boththreatened and used armed force to strike fear into those who would peacefully challenge the government's legitimacy or openly criticize its policies. Meanwhile, the repressive new Protest Law (November 2013) and Counter-terrorism Law (August 2015) have effectively sanctioned the use of excessive force.
Egyptian security forces are routinely armed with pistols and rifles. They often use batons, shotguns, water cannon and tear gas, supported by various types of armoured vehicles, to disperse protests and other politically charged public gatherings. The 2013 Protest Law allows security forces to respond "proportionately" to the use of firearms by protesters in order to protect lives, money and property - but this is interpreted in flagrant violation of international standards which only permit security forces to use lethal force in response to an imminent threat to life or serious injury.
Since the law came into force, security forces have used excessive force to ruthlessly dismantle protests, often with lethal results. In January 2015 at least 27 people died in protest-related violence, many at the hands of armed security forces. They included Shaimaa Al-Sabbagh, a political activist, poet and a young mother, who was shot dead by a police officer in central Cairo. Despite images of her dying moments going viral and sparking international outrage, the member of the security forces originally found responsible for her death has had his conviction overturned by Egypt's highest court and now must face a retrial.
Armed security forces have also conducted mass arrests of the government's critics and political opponents. Almost 12,000 people were arrested on suspicion of "terrorism" in the first 10 months of 2015 alone, according to an Interior Ministry official quoted in the Egyptian press. In January 2016 more than 5,000 residences in central Cairo were raided by armed security forces in a security sweep around the fifth anniversary of the 2011 uprising, with many activists detained.
Armed security forces arrested hundreds of people while dispersing mostly peaceful protests on 25 April against the government's decision to transfer two Red Sea islands to Saudi Arabia. Those arrested in the crackdown around the protests included human rights defenders, journalists and activists.
On 14 May, courts sentenced more than 150 people to between two and five-years' imprisonment for involvement in the protests.
A wave of enforced disappearances has seen hundreds of people abducted by armed security forces over the past year. They are held incommunicado for extended periods without access to their families or lawyers, and tortured by state security forces into "confessing" to terrorism-related offences.
There has been no accountability for serious human rights violations committed during and since the 2011 uprising. So far, the Egyptian authorities have failed to conduct effective, independent and impartial investigations into the hundreds of cases of enforced disappearances, torture and unlawful killings documented by human rights groups.
Military operations in the Sinai
The Egyptian army has been increasingly engaged in military operations against armed groups, which have launched attacks against civilians and security forces, particularly in the north of the Sinai Peninsula. The Egyptian military is known to have used heavy weapons in such operations, including armoured vehicles, tanks, Apache gunships and F-16 fighter jets.
Amnesty International is concerned about the total lack of transparency over the army's operations against armed groups.
A media blackout has been imposed on reporting about military operations in the Sinai, and journalists and independent civil society organizations have been banned from entering the area. Meanwhile, EU states have signed off on transfers of heavy weapons and equipment purportedly to help Egypt's fight against "terrorism", despite a lack of transparency and human rights guarantees regarding their use. This is particularly concerning given the complete lack of accountability for gross human rights violations perpetrated during the army's rule following the 2011 uprising.
The EU fuelling internal repression
While the records show that many EU states have all but ignored the 2013 call for a suspension of transfers of arms used for "internal repression" in Egypt, there are fears that upcoming talks could result in a further loosening or even a discontinuation of the suspension. This follows last year's decision by the USA to resume military aid to Egypt to the tune of $1.3 billion annually.
"Supplying arms that are likely to fuel such internal repression in Egypt is contrary to the Arms Trade Treaty, to which all EU states are party, and flouts the EU's Common Position on arms exports," said Brian Wood, Head of Arms Control and Human Rights at Amnesty International.
The EU and its members must stop rewarding bad behaviour by Egypt's police and military with a bonanza of arms supplies.Brian Wood, Head of Arms Control and Human Rights at Amnesty International
"The EU should immediately impose an embargo on all transfers of the types of arms and equipment being used by Egypt to commit serious human rights violations. The EU and its members must stop rewarding bad behaviour by Egypt's police and military with a bonanza of arms supplies."
Some of Egypt's biggest suppliers of arms that could be used for internal repression include:
- Bulgaria issued a total of 59 licences for EUR51,643,626 worth of military equipment to Egypt in 2014 with over EUR11 million for small arms/light weapons and ammunition. Exports to Egypt included 10,500 assault rifles, 300 light machine guns and 21 sub-machine guns.
- The Czech Republic has been a consistent supplier of small arms to Egypt. In 2014 the Czech government issued 26 licences for military goods to Egypt worth EUR19.9 million - the majority for small arms and ammunition. The Czech authorities reported to the UN that they exported 80,953 pistols and revolvers to Egypt between 2013 and 2015. Egypt's Interior Ministry had also ordered 10 million 9mm calibre cartridges from Czech arms companies in February 2014.
- France issued export licences worth more than EUR100 million in 2014 under the category of "bombs, torpedoes, rockets, missiles and other explosive devices" and "ground vehicles and components". Exports have included more than 100 Sherpa trucks, which are advertised for use by law-enforcement officials.
- Italy issued 21 licences of military equipment totalling EUR33.9 million in 2014, nearly half of which was small arms. In 2015, Italy sent more than EUR4 million worth of small arms and related parts and accessories, and has already registered the export of EUR73,391 worth of pistols or revolvers to Egypt in 2016.
Amnesty International is calling on the EU and all EU member states to:
- Impose and fully implement a binding embargo on transfers of security and policing equipment to Egypt of the types of arms used to commit or facilitate serious violations of human rights. Failing to do so would risk ongoing breaches of the EU's Common Position on arms exports, as well as the human rights provisions of the global Arms Trade Treaty.
- Impose a 'presumption of denial' policy on transfers of arms intended for use by Egypt's armed forces and air force. Reports of some aerial attacks that resulted in fatalities and serious injuries have not been effectively, independently and impartially investigated. Human rights violations committed by the armed forces during the uprising in 2011 and in the year of military rule that followed also have not been effectively investigated. Any potential export to Egypt of such items should not be authorized unless a thorough human rights risk assessment demonstrates that the Egyptian armed forces' recipient will use the equipment lawfully, including by upholding its international human rights law obligations,and unless a binding guarantee to that effect is agreed by the exporting state with the Egyptian government.
- Maintain this embargo and 'presumption of denial' policy until the Egyptian authorities put in place effective safeguards to prevent further serious violations by security forces, and carry out full, prompt, independent and impartial investigations into violations since the 2011 uprising with the aim of prosecuting those responsible for crimes in fair trials.
Amnesty International is a worldwide movement of people who campaign for internationally recognized human rights for all. Our supporters are outraged by human rights abuses but inspired by hope for a better world - so we work to improve human rights through campaigning and international solidarity. We have more than 2.2 million members and subscribers in more than 150 countries and regions and we coordinate this support to act for justice on a wide range of issues.
LATEST NEWS
Stateless Palestinian Woman Details 'Very Traumatizing' Abuse Suffered in ICE Detention
Trump administration immigration officials reportedly dismissed Ward Sakeik's ordeal as a "sob story."
Jul 06, 2025
A newlywed Palestinian woman from Texas released from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention earlier this week says she was shackled for long periods, denied food and water, and subjected to other human rights abuses during nearly five months in ICE custody—all because she is a stateless person.
Ward Sakeik, 22, was born in Saudi Arabia to Palestinian parents from Gaza. Because Saudi Arabia does not grant birthright citizenship to the children of foreign nationals, Sakeik was officially stateless when her family legally emigrated to the United States when she was 8 years old.
“I was moved around like cattle.”
Ward Sakeik, US college graduate and homeowner, speaks out following 140 days in ICE hellhole pic.twitter.com/bNTgs7362h
— World Socialist Web Site (@WSWS_Updates) July 5, 2025
Sakeik's parents subsequently applied for—and were denied—asylum in the U.S. but were allowed to remain legally in the country pending routine check-ins with ICE.
After graduating high school and the University of Texas, Arlington, starting a wedding photography business, marrying a U.S. citizen, and beginning the process of obtaining a green card, Sakeik and her husband went on their honeymoon in the U.S. Virgin Islands. She was detained shortly after arriving back in the United States after Customs and Border Protection agents flagged her for flying over international waters—a move that Department of Homeland Security officials said violated immigration policy.
"After a few hours from returning from our honeymoon, I was put in a gray tracksuit and shackles," Sakeik said at a press conference following her release. "I was handcuffed for 16 hours without any water or food on the bus. I have moved around like cattle. And the U.S. government attempted to dump me in a part of the world where I don't know where I'm going and what I'm doing or anything."
"We were not given any water or food, and we could smell the driver eating Chick-fil-A," she continued. "We would ask for water, bang on the door for food, and he would just turn up the radio and act like he wasn't listening to us."
Sakeik said unhygienic conditions at the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas—where an ICE officer was shot in the neck during a Friday evening attack—caused widespread illness among detainees.
"The restrooms are also very, very, very unhygienic," she said. "The beds have rust everywhere. They're not properly maintained. And cockroaches, grasshoppers, spiders, you name it, are all over the facility. Girls would get bit."
"I wouldn't wish this upon anybody," Sakeik said during a Saturday interview on CNN. "It was very hard, very traumatizing, and very, very difficult."
Eric Lee, an attorney for Sakeik, told CNN that immigration officials dismissed Sakeik's account as a "sob story."
"I guess what we would ask the American people is, 'Who are they gonna believe, their lying eyes or the statements of the people who are responsible for carrying out what are really crimes against humanity here in the United States?'" Lee added.
Sakeik said she now plans to advocate on behalf of women and girls imprisoned by ICE.
"I... want the world to know that the women who do come here come here for a better life, but they're criminalized for that," she said. "They are dehumanized, and they're stripped away from their rights. We have been treated as a 'less-than' just simply for wanting a better life."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Exactly What We Would Expect': Climate Scientists Weigh in on Deadly Texas Flooding
"It's not a question of whether climate change played a role—it's only a question of how much," said one expert.
Jul 06, 2025
As the death toll from catastrophic flooding in Texas continued to rise, climate scientists this weekend underscored the link between more frequent and severe extreme weather events and the worsening climate emergency caused primarily by humans burning fossil fuels.
Officials said Sunday that at least 69 people died in the floods, 59 of them in Kerr County. Of the 27 missing girls from Camp Mystic—some of whom were sleeping just 225 feet from the Guadalupe River when its waters surged during flash flooding Friday—11 are still missing.
While some local officials blamed what they said were faulty forecasts from the National Weather Service—which has been hit hard by staffing cuts ordered by the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency in line with Project 2025—meteorologists and climate scientists including Daniel Swain of the University of California, Los Angeles have refuted such allegations, citing multiple NWS warnings of potentially deadly flooding.
However, some experts asserted that vacancies at key NWS posts raise questions about forecasters' ability to coordinate emergency response with local officials.
Climate scientists do concur that human-caused global heating is causing stronger and more frequent extreme weather events including flooding.
"This kind of record-shattering rain (caused by slow-moving torrential thunderstorms) event is *precisely* that which is increasing the fastest in a warming climate," Swain wrote in a statement. "So it's not a question of whether climate change played a role—it's only a question of how much."
As Jeff Masters and Bob Henson wrote Saturday for Yale Climate Connections:
Many studies have confirmed that human-caused climate change is making the heaviest short-term rainfall events more intense, largely by warming the world's oceans and thus sending more water vapor into the atmosphere that can fuel heavy rain events. Sea surface temperatures this week have been as much as 1°F below the 1981-2010 average for early July in the western Gulf [of Mexico] and Caribbean, but up to 1°F above average in the central Gulf. Long-term human-caused warming made the latter up to 10 times more likely, according to the Climate Shift Index from Climate Central.
"The tragic events in Texas are exactly what we would expect in our hotter, climate-changed, world," Bill McGuire, professor emeritus of geophysics and climate hazards at University College London, said Saturday. "There has been an explosion in extreme weather in recent years, including more devastating flash floods caused by slow-moving, wetter, storms, that dump exceptional amounts of rain over small areas across a short time."
It’s hard to make the Texas flood tragedy worse, except to know that on the same day Trump signed a bill to stop our efforts to defeat the climate change that is causing increased frequency of disastrous floods. And giving us more expensive electricity. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/05/c...
[image or embed]
— Governor Jay Inslee (@govjayinslee.bsky.social) July 5, 2025 at 9:29 AM
Instead of taking action to combat the planetary emergency, the Trump administration is ramping up fossil fuel production while waging war on clean energy and climate initiatives. The so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed into law by Trump on Friday slashes the tax credits for electric vehicles and other renewable technologies including wind and solar energy that were a cornerstone of the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act.
Keep ReadingShow Less
27 Arrested for Defying UK Ban on Nonviolent Pro-Palestine Group
"We oppose genocide—I didn't think that was that controversial—and we support the people who resist genocide," said one arrested protester.
Jul 06, 2025
Metropolitan Police arrested at least 27 protesters who gathered in central London on Saturday to publicly support Palestine Action, a nonviolent direct action group now officially designated a terrorist organization by the U.K. government.
According to Middle East Eye, Palestine defenders including 83-year-old Rev. Sue Parfitt, a former government attorney, an emeritus professor, and health workers gathered by a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in Parliament Square, where they held signs reading, "I OPPOSE GENOCIDE, I SUPPORT PALESTINE ACTION."
Members of the group Defend Our Juries informed Metropolitan Police of their plan prior to the demonstration.
"If we cannot speak freely about the genocide that is occurring... democracy and human rights in this country are dead."
"We would like to alert you to the fact we may be committing offenses under the Terrorism Act tomorrow, Saturday 5 July, in Parliament Square at about 1pm," the group said in an open letter to Met Commissioner Mark Rowley.
"If we cannot speak freely about the genocide that is occurring, if we cannot condemn those who are complicit in it and express support for those who resist it, then the right to freedom of expression has no meaning, and democracy and human rights in this country are dead," the letter argues.
Parfitt told Novara Media that members of Defend Our Juries were "testing the law."
"I know that we are in the right place doing the right thing," she said. "...We cannot be bystanders."
"We are losing our civil liberties, we must stop that for everybody's sake," Parfitt said in a separate interview with The Guardian.
Prior to his arrest, Defend Our Juries member Tim Crosland, the former government lawyer, told The Guardian that "what we're doing here as a group of priests, teachers, health workers, human rights lawyers [is] we're refusing to be silenced."
"Because it goes to the core of what we believe in: that we oppose genocide—I didn't think that was that controversial—and we support the people who resist genocide," he added. "In theory we are now terrorist supporters and can go to prison for 14 years, which is kind of crazy. I think what we are here to do is just expose the craziness of that."
Crosland said as he was being arrested, "This is what happens in modern day Britain for opposing genocide, it's quite something isn't it?"
A bystander told Novara Media: "I just feel disgusted by this government. I voted for them and they're now arresting people who are calling for a genocide to end. And this is a Labour government, they're meant to have left-wing roots."
Members of the group Defend Our Juries publicly declare their opposition to Israel's genocidal assault on Gaza and their support for the proscribed group Palestine Action while Metropolitan Police officers look on before arresting them during a July 4, 2025 demonstration in London. (Photo: Kristian Buus/In Pictures via Getty Images)
In a statement, Defend Our Juries sarcastically said that "we commend the counter-terrorism police for their decisive action in protecting the people of London from some cardboard signs opposing the genocide in Gaza and expressing support for those taking action to prevent it."
"It's a relief to know that counter-terrorism police have nothing better to do," the group quipped.
Last week, British lawmakers voted to ban Palestine Action as a terrorist group after some of its members vandalized two aircraft at a Royal Air Force base in Oxfordshire on June 20. The group—which was founded in 2020 and has also vandalized U.S. President Donald Trump's golf course in Turnberry, Scotland—is known for taking direction action against companies that supply weapons to Israel, which is accused of genocide in an ongoing International Court of Justice case concerning the war on Gaza.
On June 23, U.K. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced plans to proscribe the group under Section 3 of the Terrorism Act of 2000, introduced under former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair and widely criticized for its overbroad definition of terrorism. The House of Commons voted 385-26 Wednesday in favor of banning Palestine Action and the House of Lords approved the designation Thursday without a vote.
Palestine Action tried to delay the ban via legal action. However, the High Court on Friday denied the group's appeal for interim relief was denied on Friday, a decision that was upheld by the Court of Appeal.
The nonviolent group is now on the same legal footing in Britain as Al-Qaeda and Islamic State. Joining or supporting Palestine Action is now punishable by up to 14 years behind bars.
At midnight, Palestine Action will be proscribed under the Terrorism Act.Their real “crime”? Exposing the UK’s role in arming Israel’s genocide.This is a dark day for our democracy.Criminalising non-violent resistance won’t silence the truth.We are all Palestine Action 🇵🇸
[image or embed]
— Zarah Sultana MP (@zarahsultana.bsky.social) July 4, 2025 at 2:38 PM
Earlier this month, a group of United Nations experts urged the U.K. government to not ban Palestine Action.
"We are concerned at the unjustified labeling of a political protest movement as 'terrorist,'" the experts wrote. "According to international standards, acts of protest that damage property, but are not intended to kill or injure people, should not be treated as terrorism."
The U.N. experts warned that under the ban, "individuals could be prosecuted for peacefully exercising their rights to freedom of expression and opinion, assembly, association, and participation in political life."
"This would have a chilling effect on political protest and advocacy generally in relation to defending human rights in Palestine," they added.
Hundreds of jurists, artists and entertainers, and others have also decried the ban on Palestine Action.
"Palestine Action is intervening to stop a genocide. It is acting to save life. We deplore the government's decision to proscribe it," Artists for Palestine U.K.—whose members include Tilda Swinton, Paul Weller, Steve Coogan, and others—wrote in a statement last month.
"Labeling non-violent direct action as 'terrorism' is an abuse of language and an attack on democracy," the artists added. "The real threat to the life of the nation comes not from Palestine Action but from the home secretary's efforts to ban it. We call on the government to withdraw its proscription of Palestine Action and to stop arming Israel."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular