Yearbook 2017
Egypt is a country located in Northern Africa, according
to Digopaul. The security situation remained unstable during
the year. In January, two attacks were carried out against
police, both on the Sinai Peninsula and partly in the desert
in the southern part of the country. The Islamic State (IS)
took on the deed in Sinai. A total of at least 15 police
officers were killed in the attacks. The following month,
three copies were shot dead in the city of al-Arish on the
Sinai Peninsula, which resulted in hundreds of copies
leaving their homes. The attacks on Egypt's Christian
minority continued in April when two churches were sued by
IS. A total of 45 people were killed in the death, which
took place in the cities of Tanta and Alexandria on Palm
Sunday. Following the events, President Abd al-Fattah
al-Sisi announced a three-month state of emergency, which
was then extended by another three months in both July and
October. In May, the state prosecutor announced that 48 IS
members would be brought before a military court. These
people were suspected of interference, partly in the
explosion in April, and for a similar attack on a chapel
next to the Coptic St. Mark's Cathedral in Cairo in December
2016. The attacks claimed a total of over 70 people's lives.
The unrest on the Sinai Peninsula continued even later in
the year. In July, seven people, including two children,
were killed when a car bomb broke out near a roadblock in
northern Sinai. The car was detonated when it was stopped by
soldiers about 200 meters from the roadblock. In the same
month, 30 people were described by the military as
"extremists" during a multi-day campaign on the Sinai
Peninsula, where the army, the air force and the police
participated. In October, twelve soldiers, three police
officers and two civilians were killed for a week. Violent
Islamists were suspected of being behind the death. In the
western part of the country, 16 police officers were killed
when unidentified perpetrators attacked the Bahariya oasis
in the Libyan desert. The number of dead among the attackers
was said to be about the same. The attack was answered with
air raids, which according to the defense force resulted in
"the death of a large number of terrorists".
In November, the bloodiest attack in modern times
occurred when 300 people were killed in an attack on a
mosque during Friday prayers in Biral-Abd in northern Sinai.
After detonating explosives and cars being set on fire
outside the mosque, the people who fled the mosque were met
by some 30 men who killed as many as they could. Although IS
did not assume responsibility for the act, the perpetrators
were suspected of having contact with the organization. A
few days later, President al-Sisi ordered the military "with
brutal force" to restore security on the Sinai Peninsula
within three months.
The protracted legal process against former dictator
Hosni Mubarak ended in March with a free sentence. Mubarak
has been hospitalized in a military hospital while serving a
three-year prison sentence for embezzlement. He was
sentenced in 2012 to life imprisonment for being responsible
for the hundreds of deaths during the so-called Arab Spring
of 2011, when Mubarak finally collapsed. That judgment was
revoked with the new ruling. By contrast, Mohammed Badie,
the Muslim Brotherhood's highest leader, was sentenced to
life imprisonment in May for lying behind "violent attacks."
Badie has previously been sentenced to death three times but
the judgments have later been changed. In June, 30 people
were sentenced to the death penalty for involvement in the
blast attack that in June 2015 costed prosecutor Hisham
Barakat life. In July, 20 supporters of former President
Muhammad Mursi were sentenced to death for causing the death
of 13 policemen in connection with a riot in August 2013. A
further 114 people were sentenced to 15 years in prison and
life imprisonment. In October, another eight death sentences
and 50 life sentences fell for the attack on the Cairo
police station in 2013. In September, Mursi's life sentence
from June 2016 was upheld by the cassation court, whose
ruling cannot be appealed.
In June, Egypt severed its diplomatic relations with
Qatar. So did Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab
Emirates, Yemen and the Maldives. The reason is that Saudi
Arabia's regime is unhappy with the Qatari TV company
al-Jazira's reporting as well as Qatar's support for the
Muslim Brotherhood and Iran. Egypt and the other countries
that have now broken with Qatar also accused the emirate of
supporting IS and al-Qaeda. On the same month, Parliament
approved the transfer of the uninhabited islands of Tiran
and Sanafir in the Red Sea to Saudi Arabia. That was to be
announced when the Saudi king Salman visited Egypt in April
2016. However, the decision has caused strong protests and
has also been rejected in two judicial bodies. Later in
June, the transfer was ratified by President al-Sisi
ratifying the agreement.
In September, Egypt and the United States conducted their
first joint military exercise since 2009. The countries
practiced every two years from 1981, but the cooperation has
been down due to the unstable situation in the country in
recent years. The same month, the human rights organization
Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report in which the
Egyptian security service was accused of systematic torture
of regime-critical prisoners. Due to the large scale of
torture cases, the actions of the security police were
similar to crimes against humanity. The Egyptian regime
responded by blocking HRW's websites.
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