Restrictions: Asset Freeze |
Hossam Bahgat is an Egyptian human rights defender and investigative journalist. He is the founder of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights and a journalist for Mada Masr.
Hossam Bahgat is an Egyptian human rights defender and investigative journalist. He is the founder of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights and a journalist for Mada Masr. He was arrested from 8 to 10 November 2015, summoned by military intelligence for ‘publishing false news that harmed national interests and disseminating information that disturbed public peace’. He had written a series of articles concerning the army and military trials.
In January 2016, he was again critical of the Egyptian regime, when he argued that the ‘level of repression now [is] significantly higher than it was under the Mubarak regime’. The next month, he was prevented from traveling to Jordan in order to participate in a United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia conference on justice in the Arab world. Then, on 17 September 2016, the Cairo Criminal Court confirmed the order to freeze his personal assets as part of the infamous Foreign Funding Case (173/2011).
On 29 July 2021, Mr Bahgat was investigated in case 173/2011. The case file includes memos accusing him of establishing and managing an entity with the objective of “working to change the mental image of citizens and to incite them against national institutions, especially the police, the judiciary, and the armed forces”.
On 29 November 2021, Mr Bahgat was sentenced to a fine of 10,000 Egyptian Pounds for “insulting the elections authority”.