HRW: Sudanese activist surfaces in detention

Sudanese authorities have confirmed that they are holding a vocal critic of the government who was forcibly disappeared in Egypt in October, 2018, Human Rights Watch said today.

Sudan’s national security authorities refused to provide information for weeks about the detention of the activist, Mohamed El Boshi, but announced charges against him on November 8.

El Boshi, 35, was reported missing in Cairo on October 10, after five armed men believed to be Egyptian security agents arrived at his apartment building and searched his apartment, witnesses in Cairo told Human Rights Watch (HRW). News of El Boshi’s disappearance surfaced on social media the next day, amid activists’ fears that Egyptian authorities had returned him to Sudan.

On November 8, Sudan’s national security agency announced criminal charges against El Boshi for espionage and crimes against the state, which carry the death penalty. Sudanese officials have in recent years brought similar charges against other rights activists. el Boshi remains in national security custody, and family members and lawyers have not been permitted to visit him.

“Egyptian and Sudanese authorities cooperated in forcibly disappearing and returning an asylum-seeker to Sudan, in clear violation of international norms and the prohibitions on enforced disappearances, persecution, and torture,” said Jehanne Henry, associate Africa director at HRW. “Having unlawfully detained him for weeks, Sudan has now charged him with serious crimes that carry the death penalty.”

According to HRW, Sudan’s draconian National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) is well-known for arbitrary detentions and abuse of detainees. Under the national security laws, officials have wide powers to arrest and detain people for up to four-and-a-half months without charge. The organisation and others have for years documented torture and abuse of detainees by NISS and urged reform of the agency.

Egypt and Sudan

In September, a Sudanese activist living in Cairo was harassed by the Egyptian security service in an attempt to make him stop his writings on social media that are considered hostile to the government of President Omar Al Bashir.

In August Egyptian authorities arrested activist Sudanese Mohamed Adam El Haj, known as Wad Teregul. His family said he was to be deported to Khartoum.

Relations between Egypt and Sudan have warmed in recent months. In July, Egypt refused entry to a prominent opposition leader, El Sadig El Mahdi, and Sudan seems to have ordered several Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood dissidents to leave the country in 2017.

Khartoum has recently announced to lift the bans on Egyptian industrial products and the entry of food products to Sudan, and will create a Media Code of Honour between the neighbouring countries.

Read the full statement of Human Rights Watch here.