Egypt Prisoners Plan Hunger Strike

Around 16,000 prisoners decided to stage a hunger strike in 11 jails next week in protest against what they describe as "maltreatment" in their jails, an independent rights group said.



The rights group "Detainees of Freedom in Egypt's Prisons" said the prisoners, all arrested in the turmoil that gripped the country since the ouster of president Mohamed Morsi by the army last year, decided to start the strike on April 30 to put pressure on the authorities to stop torture inside the prisoners and release "innocent" detainees.



Egyptian authorities have repeatedly denied reports about a torture campaign targeting prisoners affiliated to Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood.



"There is coordination among prisoners in the 11 jails on the strike," Haytham Abo Khalil, the director of NGO Victims Center for Human Rights, told Anadolu Agency on phone.



Meanwhile, the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party said in a Thursday statement that its imprisoned members are subject to violations committed by the current authorities.



"All detainees complain against deprivation from food and medicine," the party said in its statement.



The party added that prisoners are allowed to enter toilets only one time and for five minutes each.



It said prisoners' relatives also are subjected to maltreatment when they go to prisons for visits to their detained relatives.



There is not a specific survey of the number of people put in jail on the background of their opposition to Morsi's ouster.



The pro-Morsi National Alliance for the Defense of Legitimacy puts the number of political detainees at 22,000.



Egyptian authorities have unleashed a massive crackdown on the Brotherhood since the ouster of Morsi – a Brotherhood leader himself – by the military last July.



Since then, Egypt's military-backed authorities have rounded up hundreds of the Brotherhood's senior and mid-ranking members, hundreds of whom remain in detention.



In December, the Egyptian government branded the Brotherhood as a "terrorist" organization.



By Islam Mosaad



englishnews@aa.com.tr - Kahire