Sunday, February 7, 2016

Paying Respect to Giulio Regeni

And Giulio Regeni returned back to Italy Saturday afternoon.
Italy will have its own autopsy. The Egyptian National Forensics authority declared that it would finish Regeni's autopsy by the end of February !!!!!
I do not need to guess that the Italian government will finish Regini's autopsy in a week or something !!
His hometown "Fiumicello", a small village in north-eastern Italy." declared a national mourning.
The Egyptian ministry of interior is denying that it declared officially that the 28-years old researcher was killed in hit and run despite the fact that the head of Giza security directorate was the one who told Pro-regime Youm 7 news website that Thursday morning.
Earlier Saturday afternoon, dozens of Egyptians as well Italians in Egypt paid respect to Giulio Regeni at the Italian embassy in Cairo as his body departed Egypt to make on final trip back home to Italy.

At the Italian embassy in Cairo
Flowers and candles at the Italian embassy in Cairo "The Januarians"
At the Italian embassy in Cairo
The Italian embassy in Cairo Saturday afternoon

Already since the official announcement of his death on Thursday and several Pro-January 25 groups and activists like The Januarians decided to organize something to pay respect to late Regeni who came to Egypt as a researcher and loved it.
Mourning Giulio at Italian embassy in Cairo
At the Italian embassy.
I think the young lady on the right is activist Yara Sallem "Heba El-Kholy"
Many anti-regime political activists in Egypt believe the theory that he was arrested and tortured to death by security forces as his disappearance on the 25 January is similar to the forcible disappearance cases in Egypt.
Maha Makawy at the Italian embassy in Cairo
If I am not mistaken that lady appearing in AFP photo is Mrs. Maha Makkawy
, the wife of Constitution party member Ashraf Shehata who has been forcibly
disappeared for two years now 
Also, the incident of Giulio hit a nerve because it got resemblances with the case of late activist Mohamed El-Gendy who was arrested and tortured to death also at the same time from 3 years ago.
Egyptian mourners at the Italian embassy in Cairo
Egyptian mourners carry banners, one of them compare Regini to El-Gendy
The others banners "Why do you kill the foreigners
Did we {The Egyptians}Something wrong !?'
 in reference to the security's brutality  "The Januarians"
The fact that the Egyptian ministry of interior claimed that Regeni died in a hit and run accident just like El-Gendy makes many activists that the security is involved in the Italian student's tragic death.
The Janaurians FB group even launched a hashtag on Twitter and Facebook in Arabic "Giulio_is_one_of_us_and_was_killed_like_us"
Saturday afternoon, the Egyptian and Italian mourners showed up at the Italian embassy in Garden city quarter putting flowers, lighting candles and even holding banners.

Still I am very proud of that very few, mostly of Pro-Jan25 revolutionaries and activists.
You must know that those Egyptians are being attacked by another group of Egyptians, mostly of Pro-Nationalist Sisi supporters for showing their sympathy to Giulio and not showing it allegedly for the fallen soldiers in the #Italian_embassy.
Sadly, those regime supporters do not know that what those activists did at the Italian embassy was a true act of public diplomacy.
Giulio Regeni, the 28-years old Cambridge PhD student came to Egypt to study and research the trade union movements especially the independent trade union movements after the 25 January revolution.
He used to write news reports mostly critical of the Egyptian regime and send them to Italian news websites like NENA News under another name like Antonio Drius for fear of being arrested. This tells you much.
Currently, there is a fight between Regeni's family and Leftist Il Manfesto after the later published a report sent by Giulio Regeni about Egypt's trade unions after the revolution. Either way, the report is important and with my all due respect to the Regeni's family and with no respect to Il Manfesto, I only share it here because it is important and is translated into English.
Personally, it turned out that I know people who knew Regeni's friends in Egypt and they are all shocked and sad.
Giulio Regeni seemed to be a nice young bright young man who loved Egypt and its people.
Now I want you to read this op-ed by Giulio Regeni's friend Neil Pyper about Egypt and the attack on academic freedom.

3 comments:

  1. Errata corrige: "Fiumicino" is the city where the main airport of Rome is located.
    Regeni was from "Fiumicello", a small village in north-eastern Italy.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiumicello

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for the correction , our press mixed between the city and the village

      Delete
    2. Thank you for your very useful work.

      Delete

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