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2001 CIA TERROR RENDITION

EGYPT

Deportees: CIA behind torture interrogations

Two Egyptians who were forcibly deported to Egypt from Sweden by CIA agents in 2001 have blamed the US spy agency for the torture they received in their home country.

Deportees: CIA behind torture interrogations
Ahmed Agiza

Ahmed Agiza and Mohammed Al Zery were handed over to the CIA by Swedish security service agents as part of a so called terror suspect “rendition” operation carried out by the US spy agency.

For the first time, the two men have been able to share their story with the public.

In an interview on the Swedish investigative journalsim program Uppdrag Granskning, which airs on Sveriges Television (SVT) on Wednesday night, they tell their story of what happened when they were deported from Sweden.

“For a long time I have wanted people, especially Swedes, to know the whole truth,” Mohammed Al Zery told SVT.

According to Al Zery and Agiza, they were taken to Bromma Airport, a small airport near Stockholm, after being arrested by agents from Swedish security service Säpo and informed of the deportation.

At the airport, an American plane with seven CIA agents and two people from the Egyptian security service were waiting for them as they were escorted by Säpo officers.

The nine people from the plane were dressed in civilian clothing and were all masked.

Al Zery and Agiza were taken into the small police station at Bromma airport where their clothes were cut off them, their hands and feet were chained, and they were blindfolded before they were taken onto the waiting plane.

”They threw me down on the floor and pressed their knees in my back. They tore all our clothes off and put a diaper, a blindfold and transportation clothes on us,” Agiza said in the interview.

All the while, the Säpo officers, as well as conventional police officers, stood by and witnessed what the men described as excessively violent treatment.

”I was surprised and shocked. I had a positive image of Sweden, of Swedish politics and democracy,” Agiza told SVT.

A Säpo officer was told there was no room for her on the plane. Instead a Swedish police officer and an interpreter from Säpo were allowed on board.

Both men were treated unkindly by the guards during the transport down to Egypt.

Muscle relaxant given to the two Egyptians prior to the journey made it difficult for them to breathe, but when they tried to speak to the guards they received harsh reponses.

”The guard thought that I was lifting up my blindfold to see him, so he started punching me in the face,” said Al Zery to SVT.

Once the two men had arrived in Egypt they were isolated from each other for months, despite being kept only a few metres apart.

Both were kept in solitary confinement with their eyes covered at all times. The only objects in the cells were a cement slab, a water bottle, and a bottle to urinate in.

According to the two men, their interrogations would commence in the evening and go on until dawn, night after night.

Al Zery told SVT that he was systematically beaten and hung from the ceiling by his feet.

Electric shocks were also part of the routine.

”They take your clothes off, you are blindfolded, your hands are tied behind your back and your feet are chained up. Then you are put on a wet mattress. The interrogator sits down – and then he begins,” Al Zery said.

According to him, the shock treatment is different from how most people imagine it.

The interrogator has a hand-held device and he can control the strength of the shocks.

”He increases the strength. He gets to the more sensitive points – the penis and testicles – and starts doling out bursts of electricity,” he said.

The mattress is kept wet so that the prisoner will feel the shocks throughout his body. According to Al Zery, he was sometimes forced to take cold showers after the interrogations so that the injuries wouldn’t show as much.

A doctor was also present at all times during the interrogations to keep the prisoners alive.

In the interview both men say that they are certain that the Americans were behind the interrogations and that they were only using the Egyptians to do their dirty work.

”The Egyptians asked questions that related to Egypt, for example why are you attacking the regime? It was all about Egyptian interests. The Americans on the other hand asked about what was going on in Pakistan and what do you think of Osama bin Laden? It was obvious that the Americans were in control of the interrogations,” said Agiza to SVT.

The SVT report also reveals that former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak wanted to thank Sweden for their help in bringing Agiza and Al Zery back to Egypt.

According to a previously secret report sent from Sweden’s embassy in Cairo detailing a meeting with a general in the Egyptian security service, Mubarak said that he wanted “a thank you letter to be sent to the responsible Swedish minister” for Sweden’s help in the matter.

In 2008, the Swedish state agreed to pay both men 3 million kronor ($435,000) in compensation after admitting they were wrongly expelled.

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EGYPT

Two Danes climbed a pyramid. Why is Egypt mad?

Last week, a sexually-charged video and photos emerged on social media of two Danes climbing the Great Pyramid at Giza. Egyptian journalist Farah Bahgat explains the reaction in Cairo.

Two Danes climbed a pyramid. Why is Egypt mad?
Two Danes caused outrage in Egypt by climbing the Pyramid of Khufu and making a sexual video. File photo: AP Photo/Amr Nabil/Ritzau Scanpix

In 2003, an Egyptian film titled The Danish Experience premiered and instantly became a Middle Eastern blockbuster about the extreme cultural differences between Egypt and Denmark, particularly when it comes to sex. 

The Danish Experience was a comedy about a Danish woman, Anita, who visits Egypt and stays with a government minister and his four 20-something sons and teaches them her perspective on sexual freedom.

In one scene, as Anita talks about how nudity is socially acceptable in Denmark, her Egyptian host family are constantly astonished by how confidently she is tackling a topic they consider a taboo.

Fifteen years later, when 23-year-old Dane Andreas Hvid posted a video of him and a friend climbing a pyramid, along with a sexually charged photo, these cultural differences became relevant again as Egyptian anger was sparked.

Although a similar incident occurred in 2016, when a German tourist was banned from re-entering Egypt after he climbed a pyramid, it did not spark the same outrage, perhaps because the only difference was that no sex was involved.

In one of the most memorable scenes in the 2003 film, Anita takes off a blanket and appears to be naked. “Sex is not a bad thing, Mr. Qadri,” she says, while Qadri feels uncomfortable and puts the blanket back on her.

For Danes, it is socially acceptable to swim naked, and there are no laws prohibiting such nudity. There are also spaces where it is allowed to publicly have sex, such as Ørstedsparken in Copenhagen.

A study by YouGov in 2013 found that 41 percent of Danes who participated in the survey have previously engaged in sexual activity in a public space, giving Denmark the highest score for public sex among Europeans.

The total opposite is true in Egypt. “Inciting debauchery” and “harming public morality” are criminal charges that could lead to imprisonment or a fine.

Last year, an Egyptian singer, Shyma, was jailed for both charges after she appeared in a music video that was perceived as “sexually charged”.

And just a few days before Hvid’s video went viral, two conservative lawyers announced they were suing actress Rania Youssef over a “revealing dress” she wore to a film festival, accusing her of “incitement to debauchery”.

The same charges are often used in the crackdown on the LGBTQ community.

Denmark was the first country in the world to recognize same-sex marriage. In Egypt, the police arrested about 100 concert attendees last year for waving the rainbow flag.

The incident also tells us something about corruption in Egypt. In an opinion piece in Egypt’s state-owned newspaper Al Ahram, Ahmed Abdel Hakam wrote that in exchange of money everything is possible in Egypt.

Two suspects were arrested on charges of helping Hvid and his friend climb the pyramid.

One of the two, a woman, established contact between the Danish couple and the camel owner, who illegally transported them to the pyramid on the evening of November 29th for the price of 4,000 Egyptian pounds, around 1,500 kroner (200 euros), according to the Egyptian interior ministry.

“The moral that appears out of this story, even if it’s wrong, is that it is possible to commit any [act of] indecency or corruption as long as you find someone who helps you for [an amount] of money,” Hakam wrote.

Corruption is also another major difference between Egyptian and Danish societies, one that makes disrespect and vandalism of one of the world’s archaeological wonders possible – by foreigners and with Egyptian complicity.

Egypt ranks as number 117 on the Corruption Perceptions Index 2017, while Denmark ranks as number 2. The index reflects levels of trust in the government.

Social media users in Egypt have responded to the incident by in criticizing the government and its administration of the area where the pyramids and the Great Sphinx of Giza are located.

A few days after the video of the Danes climbing the Great Pyramid emerged on social media, the government announced that Orascom, a company owned by Egypt’s wealthiest man, will take over the administration of tourist facilities at the area.

The Danish Experience concludes with Anita deciding to leave Egypt after the culture clash causes conflict within her host family. Hvid has said that he is not planning to return to Egypt, fearing legal trouble over his sexually-charged, unlawful visit to the pyramids.

READ ALSO: Egyptians arrested for helping Danish couple who climbed pyramid and posed naked