Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi said on Tuesday that the new anti-terrorism draft law is not meant to oppress the people or limit freedoms, the state TV reported.
“The state must be protected in its great challenge, as we want to succeed and survive while they do not want this for us,” Sisi told the attendees during a fast-breaking ceremony, referring to terrorists who have been launching deadly attacks since the ouster of former Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in mid-2013.
The new anti-terrorism draft law recently approved by the Egyptian cabinet has raised debate in the most populous Arab country as well as concerns about freedoms and human rights.
The draft law in Egypt that would make it a crime to contradict the official version of terrorist attacks should be scrapped, Amnesty International said on Wednesday, calling the bill a “strike at the very heart of basic freedoms”.
The law, which also sets up new courts for dealing with terrorism suspects, was proposed after a June 29 car bomb killed Egypt’s top prosecutor and a series of other attacks killed 17 members of the security forces in North Sinai, the focus of an Islamist insurgency.
“The proposed counter-terrorism law vastly expands the Egyptian authorities’ powers and threatens the most fundamental rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association,” said Amnesty International’s Said Boumedouha.
“If approved, it is set to become yet another tool for the authorities to crush all forms of dissent.”
Human rights groups have accused Egyptian authorities of widespread violations since the army toppled Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in 2013 after mass protests against his rule, and say the government has rolled back freedoms won in the 2011 uprising that toppled veteran autocrat Hosni Mubarak.
The government denies that and says it is protecting the country from Islamists, including Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic State, active in North Sinai, both of which it classes as terrorist groups.
Rights groups say Egyptian prisons hold 40 000 political detainees and Amnesty said the new bill would establish special courts to rule on “terrorist” offences and would add new crimes to the list of those punishable by death.
