Egyptian appeal court has acquitted blogger Wael Abbas [1] after being sentenced to six months [2] by a lower court. The sentence came last November after an altercation on April 2009 between Abbas and his neighbor and Ahmed Maher Aglan and his police officer brother Ashraf Aglan, for accessing the internet. The two brothers raided Abbas's houses, assaulted him verbally and physically ten sued him for damaging an internet cable.
Arabic Network for Human Rights [3] (ANHRI) offered the legal support [4] to Egyptian blogger. A day before the court, ANHRI described the lawsuit as a ‘fabricated case’ and call for solidarity with Wael:
It is known that Wael Abbas has become a target for interior ministry and its officers for more than two years because of his persistent endeavors to broadcast the so called “torture clips”. Officers have repeatedly orchestrated Abbas without being deterred by prosecution
In its statement released on 18 February, 2010, Reporters without Borders [5] hailed the court order as ‘a victory':
This is a victory for netizens who express their views freely online and a setback for the government and its strategy of harassment and intimidating its critics…We now call for justice to be rendered to the blogger Kareem Amer, who has already served two thirds of his jail sentence and who should be freed unconditionally.
The trail session hold in Hadayq El Kobba in Cairo was attended by a number of bloggers and activists, who wore T-Shirts with Abbas's photo, to show solidarity with him. The session was also Tweeted [6] by some bloggers.
The two photos accompanying this post are by blogger Shahinaz Abdel Salam [7]