Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK (AOHR UK) states that the video published by Egyptian YouTuber and blogger Abdullah al-Sharif on Friday 19 August, which appears to show a member of the Egyptian army forces stationed in the Sinai Peninsula executing a child in cold blood, must be immediately investigated.
Regardless of the video’s age or provenance, it appears to reveal behaviour that is impossible to justify on any grounds. Egyptian military forces in the Sinai often act without impunity, and indeed appear to have been given a green light to carry out field executions – which is to say, toe carry out murder. Al-Sharif’s is only the latest video appearing to show Egyptian armed forces’ use of such barbaric tactics in the Peninsula.
AOHR UK affirms that any such crimes would conform to a wider pattern of extra-legal measures that the state has adopted in its ‘anti-terrorism’ campaign in Sinai, which include the enforced disappearance of 100s of people, the use of indiscriminate violence, and so on.
AOHR UK hereby calls on all those nations which provide military support to the Egyptian regime – with the United States of America in the lead – to cease all such support in light the same regime’s blatant disregard for even the most basic human rights.