Egyptian government committee offers its approach to human rights

A correspondent in Egypt

May 20, 2021

A protestor makes the "victory sign" with her hands during a global solidarity demonstration for political change in Egypt in Trafalgar Square, London, on Feb. 12, 2011. The event was organized by Amnesty International and the ITUC, Human Rights Watch, the NUS, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network and the Arab Program for Human Rights Activists. — CARL DE SOUZA/AFP via Getty Images

On May 8, Egypt’s Permanent Supreme Committee for Human Rights, a body established in 2018 by Prime Minister Mustafa Madbouly, held a meeting with representatives of a number of state-aligned civil society groups to discuss an ambitious and equally dubious five-year national government strategy for human rights. The document, which was also reviewed the day after with the Committee for Human Rights of Egypt’s House of Representatives, will be the first of its kind and will serve as a guide for the government on how to improve human rights. It is set to go into effect by mid-2021.

“The five-year strategy is important [in order to] review and adopt a broader [approach to human rights], as they may develop over time,” parliament member Tarek Radwan, head of the House of Representatives’ Human Rights Committee, told Al-Monitor. “Human rights matters develop from time to time, and that is why it needs revision,” he added.