A lawsuit accusing Egypt’s former prime minister of overseeing the torture of an American citizen could test President Joe Biden’s pledge to hold foreign governments accountable for their human rights failings.

The US District Court in the District of Columbia will soon decide whether Hazem el-Beblawi, Egypt's interim premier from 2013 to 2014, holds diplomatic immunity status that would shield him from a federal lawsuit filed in June by activist Mohamed Soltan. The suit asserts that Beblawi directed and monitored the “brutal, orchestrated regime of detention and torture” of Soltan, who was arrested after live-tweeting Egypt's violent crackdown on protesters in 2013. During his nearly 22-month imprisonment, Soltan says prison guards tortured him with a purposefully starved attack dog, seizure-inducing strobe lights, sleep deprivation and other forms of extreme physical and emotional abuse. 

His lawsuit was filed under the Torture Victim Protection Act, a US law that gives federal courts jurisdiction over suits filed by victims of state-sponsored torture abroad. Soltan, who was released from Egyptian custody in 2015 following sustained pressure from the Barack Obama administration, says his case is as much about deterring future human rights abuses as it is holding Egypt accountable for his own ordeal.

Since seizing power in 2013, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has waged an unprecedented clampdown on peaceful dissent. Of the estimated 60,000 political prisoners jailed under Sisi’s watch are a number of US citizens and permanent residents, including Soltan’s father, who is serving a life sentence for his role in Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.