Egyptian Military Sentences Three Years to Nabil, An Egyption Blogger, For Insulting The Army

Undoubtedly the reasons behind the resign of the Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was very much backed up by services of Facebook and other social media, but as it turn out at least the military of the country will not let itself be a subject of such change. The Egypt’s ruling military council, which is supreme as the country still runs in emergency rule until democratic elections, has sentenced a 26 year-old blogger, Maikel Nabil for three years’ of imprisonment. This punishment was sentenced for apparently doing the crime of “spreading false information” about the Egyptian military.

Mikael Nabil, the blogger

Upon inquiry regarding the case trial of Nabil, a member of Egypt’s military council claimed bluntly that there is no second opionion regarding the freedom of expression been protected under the Egyptian law, but it he claimed that it was still a crime to do or say anything that will directly threaten the safety of the Egyptian army.

According to the blog post of Nabil, traced back in March, he had posted several images and video clips which allegedly showed the military police of Egypt thrashing protesters during one of the world’s biggest uprising. Army was alleged few times before as well but it had every time refused any such allegation and claimed that it did not use any unnecessary force against the protesters at the time of protests.

On the other hand, the Human Rights Watch’s Joe Stork, who is the Deputy Director of Middle East, repotedly said that “Maikel Nabil’s three-year sentence may be the worst strike against free expression in Egypt since the Mubarak government jailed the first blogger for four years in 2007.” He also made the allegation that “The sentence is not only severe, but it was imposed by a military tribunal after an unfair trial.” Nabil’s sentence is not yet to be considered concluded as it still needs to be approved by the chief of the military district.

Numerable Egyptians civilians have reported openly claiming that they were victims of torture and abuse during the time of the protests by the military itself. Even the Egyptian media outlets are allegedly being warned for never publishing any kind of information related to the military before it has been pre-approved.