Arab Organisation for Human Rights in UK (AOHR UK) has published a report entitled (Children without Rights). The report, offers a detailed overview of cases of arbitrary arrest and torture of children in Egypt.
According to the report, an increasing number of children under 18 have taken to the streets to protest the military coup in Egypt by taking part in demonstrations and sit-ins. Coup authorities have responded with excessive force resulting in the death and injury of many children and the arrest of hundreds more at their homes, schools and on the street. Many of those were forcefully disappeared and tortured.
The report documented the arrest of 575 children since the 3rd of July 2013 coup but stressed this number was much lower than the actual figures as there have been documented cases in which the real age of children was not listed on the case file to justify holding those minors in the same cells with adults.
The report presented the cases of 16 children whose parents confirmed had been treated in a manner which contravenes local and international human rights laws. These abuses include arbitrary arrest, extending remanding them in custody without probable case, abuse of their right to a fair trial, holding minors and adults in the same cells, detaining them in locations far from their homes, forceful disappearance of children, torture to extract false confessions, neglect, and holding them under inhumane conditions. The report asserted that the actions of the Egyptian authorities constitute a glaring violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child adopted in 1989.
According to the report, abuses of children’s rights have reached unprecedented and dangerous levels. Egyptian authorities have ignored all pleas from human rights organisations to put an end to these abuses. Indeed, it seems there are directives to crack down on all voices of dissent regardless of the age and gender of those who oppose the authorities.
The report called upon the UN to interfere to protect the lives of children languishing in Egyptian prisons.
