Egyptian President Abdul Fattah
al-Sisi has approved stringent new counter-terrorism laws to fight a
growing Islamist insurgency.
The laws establish special courts and
offer additional protection from legal consequences for military and
police officers who have used force.
They also impose the death penalty for anyone found guilty of setting up or leading a terrorist group.
Rights groups say the legislation will be used by Mr Sisi to crush dissent.
For the past two years, Egypt has been in the grip of an insurgency by Islamist groups that aim to topple Mr Sisi's government.
The
Egyptian president vowed back in June to bring in tough new
legislation, following the assassination by car bomb of a public
prosecutor.
Under the new laws being introduced on Monday:
trials for suspected militants will be
fast-tracked through special courts. Anyone found guilty of joining a
militant group could face 10 years in prison
financing terrorist groups will also carry a penalty of life in prison (25-year term)
inciting violence or creating websites deemed to spread terrorist messages will carry sentences of five to seven years
journalists can be fined between
200,000 and 500,000 Egyptian pounds (£16,300-£41,000; $25,550-$64,000)
for contradicting official accounts of militant attacks. The original
draft of the law was amended following domestic and international outcry
after it initially called for a two-year prison sentence
Egypt has seen a growing violent insurgency over the past two years
Rights groups have warned that
the legislation could be used to crush dissent, lock up opponents and
impose further restrictions on freedom of expression.
Hundreds of members of Egypt's security forces have been killed by militant attacks in the country's Sinai region.
The
insurgency has intensified since Mr Sisi, then chief of the army,
ousted the Islamist former President Mohammed Morsi after mass protests
against his rule in 2013.
The most active insurgent group - known
now as Sinai Province and before that as Ansar Bait al-Maqdis - has
pledged allegiance to the so-called Islamic State militant group.
Mr
Sisi has overseen a crackdown on Islamists, jailing thousands of
alleged supporters and sentencing scores to death, including Mr Morsi,
who belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood.
The government claims that the Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist group, while it says it is committed to peaceful activism.
In
February, Mr Sisi signed off on another anti-terrorism law that gave
authorities sweeping powers to ban groups on charges ranging from
harming national unity to disrupting public order.
UK intelligence agencies have a flawed anti-terrorism strategy, former shadow home secretary David Davis has said.
The
Tory MP argued the case of Mohammed Emwazi - the Islamic State
extremist known as "Jihadi John" - showed relying on disrupting suspects
was ineffective.
Extremists like Emwazi - who was known to MI5
before going to Syria - had been left free to "carry out evil deeds", he
said, calling for more prosecutions.
But Home Secretary Theresa May said UK security services were "true heroes".
Writing in the Guardian,
Mr Davis said: "Given the numbers who appear to have 'slipped through
the net' it is legitimate to ask: how many more people must die before
we start to look more closely at the strategy of our intelligence
services?"
Kuwaiti-born Emwazi, who is in his mid-20s and from
west London, was this week identified as the person seen in beheading
videos of Western hostages.
Mr Davis wrote: "The problem is not new. The fact is that the
intelligence services have long utilised tactics that have proved
ineffective.
"One of the results of this policy is that it leaves
known terrorists both to carry out evil deeds, and to recruit more
conspirators.
"As a result, the problem on the street grows progressively larger."
Mr
Davis called for a similar approach to that of the US, where
authorities are legally obliged to pursue and convict those who endanger
the public.
However, Mrs May defended the UK's security and intelligence services.
"You
might not see the work they do. You might not know the risks they take.
You might not be told about the plots they stop," she told the
Conservative Party's Welsh conference.
"These remarkable men and women are true heroes. And they deserve the support and respect of every single one of us."
Control orders
Earlier,
former independent reviewer of anti-terror legislation Lord Carlile
said the government had been wrong in 2010 to abolish control orders
which placed terrorist suspects under close supervision.
He said it was likely Emwazi and his associates would have been subjected to control orders - had they still been in existence.
"Those control orders would have contained relocation conditions," he told the BBC.
"There is therefore a decent argument - if not a very strong argument
- that what Mohammed Emwazi has done would not have occurred had
control orders continued."
He said it was "unfair" to criticise
the British security services, adding that any suggestion Emwazi had
been radicalised by intelligence agencies was "an absurdity".
When
agencies approached people - as they were alleged to have done with
Emwazi before he left for Syria - they planned it "very carefully".
"They assess the people they are going to approach and there is always a reason," Lord Carlile said.
"Out
there in the security services are people whose names we don't know,
who are the unsung heroes, who have protected this country over many
years now," he added.
Prime Minister David Cameron has defended
the UK's security services, saying their "dedication and work has saved
us from plots on the streets of the UK that could have done us immense
damage" within the last few months.
