Fahmy firmly trapped in Egypt’s tangled politic [THE GLOBE AND MAIL]

September 2, 2015

I was on the phone with him only days before. He’d wanted to meet up. We discussed his case briefly, and I told him I thought he’d either be acquitted, or he’d be given a suspended sentence, which would mean no more jail time. But on Saturday, Canadian-Egyptian journalist Mohamed Fahmy was sentenced to three years in jail by a Cairo court.

The Cairo bureau chief, along with fellow journalist Baher Mohamed, had been working with al-Jazeera English in late 2013 when they were first arrested, along with Australian Peter Greste and three students: Sohaib Saad, Khaled Mohamed and Shadi Abdel Hamid. This wasn’t the first verdict – this was a retrial that had been ordered by a judge who had harshly criticized the original trial that led to convictions for these journalists and students. He wasn’t the only one who harboured reservations, to say the least, about that trial – the evidence, if one can call it as such, included pop-music videos and pictures of safari trips. In short, irrelevant and inconsequential – but these journalists and students were still convicted and given jail time.

For Mr. Greste, the solution to this embarrassingly bizarre and absurd case was a presidential order for deportation. It’s a confusing solution – the deportation order did not prevent Mr. Greste from being placed on the retrial list, though it is unclear how he could even re-enter the country after being deported. Nor was Mr. Greste permitted to defend himself via video-link in an Egyptian diplomatic mission overseas. It is, nevertheless, a solution that Mr. Fahmy is now seeking – months ago, he renounced his Egyptian nationality documents, so as to become applicable for that solution.

A presidential pardon would obviously be a preferable solution for all concerned, because it would wipe the slate clean. But it is also a rather dubious option to expect – Cairo has made it clear that it expects legal processes to exhaust themselves first, before any pardon is considered. In that regard, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi is likely sending a message to the judiciary – that he’s not getting involved in its affairs in such a direct fashion.

It’s an interesting message, because it tells us something about the nature of this political dispensation, after the military removed the former president, Mohamed Morsi, from office after widespread protests. Cairo is patently run according to a dissipation of power centres – the presidency and the armed-forces institutions may be the most powerful, but they are not all-powerful either.

That also tells us something about Ottawa’s approach in engaging in soft diplomacy around this case. The case is partly about freedom of the press, of course – but it is also substantially about Doha and Cairo engaging in a proxy war. The Qatari sheikhdom has used al-Jazeera media as an extension of its foreign-policy apparatus, and particularly the Arabic channels as support media for Islamists in Egypt. Cairo now loathes the Muslim Brotherhood – and has taken al-Jazeera to task in a variety of ways, not least this particular case. That none of the Jazeera journalists on trial are responsible for any of this is entirely relevant to them and to the truth of what is happening – but is immaterial to the proxy war.

As that proxy war continues to unfold, with elements in Cairo’s security establishment and elsewhere remaining deeply angry at what they see as Doha’s “interference” (and it is a loosely defined term), where does that leave Ottawa? For months, it has tried to impress upon Cairo’s diplomatic services and state institutions the importance of resolving this case satisfactorily – and by all counts, received promising communication. The expectation was high that Mr. Fahmy would be released – because it was the only outcome that made sense for Egypt’s strategic interests.

But if nothing else, this case has shown clearly how the dissipation of power centres in Cairo, and the presence of an international dispute dimension, makes it difficult to account for all the variables. Nevertheless, positive solutions are still there on the table, if the Egyptian presidency so desires to implement them.

Source: The Globe and Mail 

Photo Credit: AP.