Egypt's prosecution granted on Monday an LE10,000 bail for the Journalists Syndicate Head Yehia Qalash after being called in for questioning on an incident that started this month when police stormed the syndicate and arrested two journalists. Qalash refused to pay bail.
The prosecution is charging Qalash with sheltering two wanted individuals, journalists Mahmoud El-Sakka and Amr Badr, who the police arrested on 1 May in the unprecedented move of storming the syndicate, board member of the syndicate Karem Mahmoud told Ahram Online.
The syndicate's General Secretary Gamal Abdel-Reheem and the Undersecretary Khaled El-Balshy are being investigated on the same charges, they refused to pay bail too.
The prosecution is scheduled to review the trio's case in a matter of hours, and either release them without bail or order a detention pending investigation, Mahmoud added. They are currently being held at Qasr Al-Nile Police Station.
The trio are facing charges with spreading false news by publishing that over 40 policemen stormed the journalists syndicate on 1 May to arrest Sakka and Badr.
The prosecution, according to Mahmoud, said only a handful of policemen entered the syndicate's headquarters in downtown Cairo. Both El-Sakka and Badr were wanted for "spreading false news."
The two journalists, who run the progressive 25 January news portal, were among many ordered arrested ahead of the 25 April protests against the Egyptian-Saudi Red Sea island maritime border agreement in April.
The prosecution previously imposed a media gag order on the storming of the syndicate.
They refused to pay bail as one of charges, spreading false news, doesn't mandate a bail and also because Qalash requested a judge to look into the case, which was denied, a statement by the Journalists Syndicate read.
The syndicate's board will hold an urgent meeting on Monday at 4:00 pm Cairo local time "to discuss the repercussions of the detention" of Qalash, El-Balshy, and Abdel-Reheem, a syndicate statement read.
