![Egyptian policemen driving on a road leading to the North Sinai provincial capital of El-Arish [KHALED DESOUKI/AFP via Getty Images]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/GettyImages-1006705352.jpg?fit=1200%2C799&ssl=1)
A cartoonist and translator for the independent news outlet Al-Manassa was arrested by Egyptian security forces at his Cairo home in the early hours yesterday. According to Mada Masr, his wife, Nada Mougheeth, reported that home security footage showed officials arriving at 1:30 am and leading Ashraf Omar away blindfolded forty minutes later. The officers also confiscated a large sum of money and Omar’s computer.
In the past month, Omar’s satirical cartoons have criticised Egypt’s electricity crisis, national debt, and the sale of state assets to Gulf investors. Yesterday, Al-Manassa editor-in-chief Nora Younis condemned the arrest, stating that Omar’s work did not violate any laws, and called for his immediate release.
Egyptian translator, cartoonist, and journalist for the newspaper @almanassa_ar, Ashraf Omar, has been arrested. A security force in civilian clothes raided his residence, arrested him at 1:30 AM on Monday, and took him to an unknown location.
Info: https://t.co/D4EONN1ggI… pic.twitter.com/t8pRG3Nykl
— Gianluca Costantini (@channeldraw) July 22, 2024
The outlet also called on Egypt’s Attorney General, Mohamed Shawky, “to clarify the journalist’s position, announce his place of detention, the charges against him, and enable his lawyer to meet with him.”
OPINION: Egypt: Freedom in exchange for silence
The chair of the Journalists’ Syndicate, Khaled El-Balshy, demanded Omar’s release and called on the authorities to reveal his whereabouts. He expressed the union’s “full solidarity” with the cartoonist and affirmed his “fundamental right as a journalist to express citizens’ suffering through his drawings.”
My friend cartoonist & translator Ashraf Omar was arrested at 1.30am, blindfolded & his home raided with valuables confiscated by plainclothed security forces in #Egypt. His whereabouts are still unknown. These are some of his caricatures he’s been penalised for #أشرف_عمر_فين https://t.co/9tmZTqDFMX pic.twitter.com/LnBbaESM3P
— Farid Y. Farid (@FaridYFarid) July 22, 2024
Earlier this month, journalist Khaled Mamdouh was also arrested, taking the number of imprisoned media workers in the country to 23.
Reporters Without Borders ranks Egypt 170th out of 180 countries in terms of press freedom, noting that, “Censorship, police raids, office shutdowns, arrests, sham trials, forced disappearances and arbitrary detentions are a daily reality for Egyptian journalists.”
During his career, Omar has contributed his artwork to numerous outlets, and his translations have been covered in various publications, including works on political history and his journalistic writings.