Sanaa Seif, the sister of the imprisoned Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd el-Fattah, called for his release at the UN climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
Catherine Boudreau/Insider
Egyptian-British activist Sanaa Seif is calling for her brother’s release from an Egyptian jail.
Her advocacy during the UN’s climate summit is drawing attention to Egypt’s human-rights record.
Egypt is hosting the COP27 meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh, and Insider is covering the events.
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt – Sanaa Seif traveled to the UN climate summit to focus the world’s attention on the plight of her brother, Alaa Abd el-Fattah, an activist and symbol of the 2011 uprising in Egypt who’s spent nearly a decade in jail.
The trip is working. Reporters and attendees of COP27 from around the world swarmed Seif on Tuesday following a press conference, where Seif joined climate activists to criticize governments that jail climate and human-rights advocates in places like the Middle East, Latin America, and Southeast Asia.
“Whatever happens, I feel like Alaa has won the symbolic battle by your show of support,” Seif said. “I just hope his body isn’t sacrificed.”
Abd el-Fattah went on a hunger strike in April and stopped drinking water ahead of the UN climate summit to protest what he and human-rights advocates say is unjust imprisonment and cruel detention conditions. He is at risk of death, said his family, who’ve asked the UK’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to secure Abd el-Fattah’s release during meetings with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on Tuesday.
The UK foreign office minister, Andrew Mitchell, confirmed that the two leaders discussed the issue, a spokesperson for a group working on Abd el-Fattah’s release said.
The Egyptian government has denied mistreatment, and this summer a member of the presidential-pardon committee said Abd el-Fattah was among those being considered for possible release, reported Al-Ahram, an Egyptian state-owned newspaper.
Seif’s activism has increased scrutiny of Egypt’s record on human rights, which advocacy groups say is stained by thousands of unjust arrests and imprisonments since the 2011 revolution that toppled former President Hosni Mubarak.
Amnesty International reported that in the lead-up to COP27, 1,540 people were arrested and questioned over exercising free speech and freedom of association. The Egyptian government also released 766 prisoners during that time, following a decision by Fattah el-Sisi to reactivate the presidential-pardon committee, the human-rights group said.
Protests are noticeably absent from Sharm el-Sheikh, a resort city along on the Red Sea spread across long stretches of highway. Certain websites are blocked, including Human Rights Watch and Al Jazeera. There are also reports that the official COP27 app is bugged with spyware.
While demonstrations are technically allowed, they are only allowed in one building within the sprawling conference center and only with advance notice and registration.
During the press conference on Tuesday, the Egyptian lawmaker Amr Darwish stood and criticized Seif for inciting foreign countries against Egypt and called Abd el-Fattah a “criminal prisoner,” before UN security escorted the lawmaker out.
Another Egyptian in the audience who said he worked as a human-rights defender raised concerns about a double standard for prisoners in Egypt with foreign passports like Abd el-Fattah, who holds British citizenship. He added that foreign intervention in human-rights reform in Egypt “is fated to fail” and would harm the country’s people.
Seif said her family has exhausted every legal route in Egypt to secure her brother’s release, to no avail. Seif said she and her family are among tens of thousands of Egyptians who are, or have been, political prisoners. The only thing they can do is continue to put pressure on world leaders, she added, which she fears puts her life at risk.
“After COP, I don’t know if I’ll be alive or not,” she said.