Egypt investigates allegations of torture, sexual assault of detainee in Alexandria police custody

Police brutality has reportedly continued in Egypt as a recent case is currently under investigation in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria where a 24-year-old man had allegedly been tortured and sexually assaulted while in police custody earlier this month.

The local prosecution office in Sidi Gaber neighbourhood in the Mediterranean city opened an investigation into human rights violations allegedly committed by security forces at the police station against the young man, a local rights group said in a statement.

"The Egyptian Network for Human Rights [ENHR] has monitored and documented that Rabie Hussein Mohamed Nasr had been subjected to sexual assault as he resisted, cried for help and begged [them to stop]," the statement read.

According to ENHR, Nasr, who has been remanded in custody, pending investigations into criminal charges against him, was reportedly punished for refusing to act as an informant for the police and spy on his cellmates.

The charges against Nasr have not been identified in the statement. 

The young man was also allegedly threatened with being framed for other crimes in case he refused to comply with the policemen's demands, the group said.

Witnesses told ENHR that they saw Nasr in "bad shape" in his underwear after his belongings had been confiscated as he was being transferred to prison on 5 September, which prompted the watchdog to file an official complaint before the local prosecutor’s office to demand a probe into the incident. 

ENHR also called on the prosecutor-general of Egypt to look into the case.

The New Arab could not independently verify the claims at the publication time.

'Systematic' police brutality

Human Rights advocates have long argued that systematic police brutality in Egypt is allegedly part of the culture of the country’s security apparatus.

A similar incident to Nasr's was that of Emad El-Kebir that took place in the capital Cairo back in 2006 when a driver was stripped and sexually assaulted as a form of "punishment".

The act was videotaped by one of the policemen on scene, later leaked and went viral, sparking outrage by Egyptians nationwide.  

Perhaps the incident of Khaled Saeed, tortured to death by two policemen in Alexandria, almost four years later, was the last straw after which Egyptians stood out against "a police state."

The Facebook page "We Are All Khlaed Saeed" mobilised hundreds of thousands of Egyptians, urging them to take to the major streets of the iconic Tahrir Square in downtown Cairo and other major ones nationwide to protest against police cruelty on the following "Police Day" dated 25 January 2011. The protests, which, continued for 18 days, manifested into an uprising that toppled the regime of long-time autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

But almost 13 years on, the status quo of human rights in the Arab World's most populous country remains in hands of the regime of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, with a track record so far of overseeing the worst human rights violations and civil rights and media restrictions in Egypt's modern history.