• MB News
  • November 17, 2017
  • 5 minutes read

Muslim Brotherhood Leaders in Al ‘Aqrab Prison Begin Hunger Strike

Muslim Brotherhood Leaders in Al ‘Aqrab Prison Begin Hunger Strike

A number of Muslim Brotherhood leaders in Al ‘Aqrab prison carry out a hunger strike in protest of mistreatment and violations.


Former spokesman of the Muslim Brotherhood, Dr. Ahmed Aref, as well as Dr. Essam Al Haddad and a number of detainees in Al ‘Aqrab prison have declared a hunger strike in protest against torture inside the prison.

During a court hearing on Wednesday regarding the case known as the Rabaa ‘Sit-in Breaking’ and in a video broadcast by Al Jazeera satellite channel, Ahmed Aref talked about the systematic torture in Al ‘Aqrab prison. He said: “life in Al ‘Aqrab prison is not a picnic or just simple life; we are talking about incidents of continuous, systematic, long-term torture.”

Aref added: “as it is impossible for any honorable Egyptian to accept normalization with Tel Aviv, it is also true that no free and honorable Egyptian accepts normalization with torture, whether it is directed against Egyptians in general, or against freedom fighters inside the prison.”

Aref confirmed that he is on hunger strike: “I started a hunger strike last Saturday, Amr Zaki started a week ago, and Essam Sultan started his hunger strike 35 days ago. Essam Al Haddad, a 64-year-old former President aide who suffers Angina, is now jailed in Al ‘Aqrab prison and is in need to urgent cardiac catheterization, has started full hunger strike 3 days ago.” 

Essam Al Haddad, an aide to the freely elected Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, has started a full hunger strike in Al ‘Aqrab prison last Monday to protest the humiliating mistreatment by prison officials, his wife Mona Imam said.

His family said in a statement circulated by the media that he had taken yesterday all his belongings out of his solitary cell protesting the humiliating mistreatment and severe restrictions, especially recently after replacing some prison officials. Dr Ahmed Aref and others are also on full hunger strike. 

His family added: “The method used in the prison to punish the hunger striker is to strip his cell and steal his belongings. Instead of dealing with these criminals and their sniffer dogs, he took everything out of the cell. He has been on hunger strike since Monday, as they told me.”

The inmates of Al ‘Aqrab prison had begun a partial hunger strike nearly a month ago to protest the ban on visits for more than a year, and prohibiting medicines, clothing, mattresses, and canteen food.

The strike came a day after the death of Labor Party leader Sheikh Abdul Rahman Lutfi, who died two weeks after a hunger strike in protest of subjecting him to systematic violations in prison, and also two weeks after the death of Nubian activist, Gamal Sorour, due to diabetic coma as a result of medical negligence.