Why Is the World Silent? (on Egypt)

Disappeared by Egypt’s Military
By KHALED AL-QAZZAZ

TORA, Egypt — In a few days’ time, I will complete 365 days of imprisonment, more than half spent in solitary confinement and under severe limitations in the maximum-security Scorpion wing of Tora prison in Cairo. I have spent the past year thinking about what drove me to where I am today. I have also been thinking about an explanation for why politicians, human rights activists and the media have largely been silent about my case.

I am an engineer by education and an educator by profession. After the Egyptian revolution in 2011, I became interested in politics. I joined the presidential campaign and then found myself chosen to be the foreign relations secretary to Egypt’s first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi, in July 2012.

When the military ousted Mr. Morsi’s government, it was predictable that the president and his aides would pay a heavy price. I made the decision, along with eight other staff members, to wait with the president for the moment of his arrest on July 3, 2013. On the orders of the newly appointed secretary of defense, the chief of the Republican Guard arrested Mr. Morsi along with the rest of us. I expected this. What I did not expect was the silence that followed our arrests.

Over the year of Mr. Morsi’s presidency, our government met with scores of world leaders, either through official visits or during international conferences. I attended almost every meeting as the president’s note-taker. We worked closely with Western leaders and their envoys to broker peace in the region.

more

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/28/opinion/khaled-al-qazzaz-disappeared-by-egypts-military.html