THE family of a young man, allegedly tortured to death by police in the Egyptian coastal city of Alexandria, held congregational prayers for the soul of the deceased, which were attended by hundreds, including tens of activists and relatives.
Cordoned off by dozens of anti-riot police, those performing the prayers shouted anti-police slogans and accused them of torturing Khaled Saeed to death.
"We have filed a report to the Prosecution General to re-investigate the brutal killing of Saeed. This is part of the police practices against innocent Egyptians," the mother of Saeed said.
Saeed’s family claim that police from Sidi Gaber Department had beaten him to death on an Alexandria street after he posted a video on the Internet of officers purportedly sharing the spoils from a drug bust among themselves.
Images of 28-year-old Saeed's broken body were posted on social networking websites, where activists dubbed him the "martyr of the Emergency Law",
referring to the law that has been in force in Egypt for 29 years.
"These people have no mercy. They deserve hanging in public in order to be an example for those who humiliate and kill the innocent," Saeed's mother said.
The Interior Ministry, meanwhile, denied he was tortured, saying in a statement that he was an ex-convict who died due to swallowing a bag of narcotics when detectives approached him.
However, Saeed's beating to death, which took place a week ago, has become a rallying cry for Egypt's political opposition. Activists say it is an example of rampant abuses made possible by the Emergency Law. Amnesty International and other rights groups on Friday demanded an independent investigation, after the two detectives accused of beating Saeed were released.
"This was revenge" for exposing the policemen in an Internet video, said the man's brother, Ahmed Saeed, in a telephone interview with AP from Alexandria.
He and other relatives as well as the family's lawyer say witnesses told them two plainclothes officers had confronted Saeed in an Internet cafe on Sunday and began arguing with him. The officers slammed his head against a table, dragged him outside, smashed his head against a metal door and continued to beat him even after he was dead, his brother said.
An uncle, Ali el-Guindi, said a police van later dumped Saeed's body outside his house.
The man's brother, Ahmed, said he saw his body a day after his death. His jaw was twisted, his rib cage mangled and his skull cracked. Similar images were posted on bloggers' websites and he confirmed their authenticity.
The "shocking pictures ... are a rare, firsthand glimpse of the routine use of brutal force by the Egyptian security forces, who expect to operate in a climate of impunity, with no questions asked," Amnesty International said in
a statement.
Aida Seif al-Dawla, the head of an Egyptian human rights group dealing with torture victims, said it is no longer enough to ask for an investigation.
"We live in a country where there is absolutely no law," she told AP. "We want the sacking and trial of the head of the police."
Mohamed ElBaradei, a leading government critic and Nobel Peace Prize winner, wrote on his Facebook and Twitter pages that "Khaled's life must not be lost in vain". Police torture – including sexual abuse – is routine in Egypt, claim human rights groups, while the Government denies it is systematic and asserts that wrongdoers are strictly punished.
