Jailed British-Egyptian activist Alaa Abdel Fattah is starting a brand new stage of his starvation strike, based on his household, who concern for his life.
It comes amid rising requires his launch as Egypt prepares to host the COP27 local weather summit this weekend.
For greater than 200 days, Abdel Fattah has taken in simply 100 energy to push Egypt to permit British consular entry.
The 40 yr previous has instructed family members he’ll now drink solely water till Sunday after which plans to cease even that.
“Alaa is utilizing the one software out there to him, his physique, to battle for all times. Proper now he isn’t residing like a human being,” his sister Sanaa Seif instructed me. “He is very frail already. I fear about him dying.”
When she final noticed him in jail – behind a plastic display, on one of many month-to-month visits which he’s allowed – he was “pores and skin on bone”, with sunken eyes and little power, she says.
As delegates put together to fly to the Crimson Sea resort of Sharm el Sheikh for the COP27 summit, Ms Seif is constant a sit-in exterior the UK International, Commonwealth & Growth Workplace (FCDO) – her tiny blue tent dwarfed by the imposing buildings of Westminster.
The 28-year-old human rights defender, who has served three jail sentences in Egypt herself on prices that fellow activists condemned as bogus, says she has been buoyed by solidarity from all over the world – with Greta Thunberg and Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe among the many guests.
However the household has been deeply upset by the British authorities’s response.
“Egypt and Britain have a really robust relationship,” Ms Seif says. “The UK has helped Egypt quite a bit within the logistics of COP. However they are not keen to indicate any enamel.
“I think about in the event that they had been exerting any strain, at the least they might have consular entry to Alaa.”
Final week, 64 MPs and friends within the Home of Lords wrote to International Secretary James Cleverly, urging him to make sure that the UK used the chance of the summit to safe his launch. “Alaa’s scenario is so grave that it requires a strong message,” they mentioned.
An FCDO spokesperson instructed the BBC: “We’re working laborious to safe Alaa Abdel Fattah’s launch and we proceed to lift his case on the highest ranges of the Egyptian authorities.
“The overseas secretary most not too long ago raised his case when he met Egyptian International Minister [Sameh] Shoukry on the United Nations Common Meeting in September.”
Abdel Fattah was an vital determine in a pro-democracy rebellion that led to the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
Underneath the authoritarian rule of President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi, who got here to energy in 2014, he has spent more often than not in jail or police detention. His newest five-year sentence was for allegedly “broadcasting false information” – a cost human rights teams condemned as spurious.
Abdel Fattah obtained British citizenship final December via his London-born mom.
Human rights teams have mentioned he’s one in every of an estimated 60,000 Egyptian political prisoners and have accused the federal government in Cairo of attempting to “greenwash” its repressive repute via its internet hosting of the local weather summit.
“Freedom of speech is a prerequisite for local weather justice!”, the UN Particular Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Setting, David Boyd, mentioned in a tweet.
“Upfront of COP27, I’m becoming a member of the refrain of worldwide voices calling for the rapid launch of Alaa Abdel Fattah, an Egyptian activist who has languished in jail for years merely for voicing his opinion.”
The Egyptian authorities has insisted there aren’t any political prisoners within the nation.
Abdel Fattah’s imprisonment is taking a rising toll on his household, together with his 10-year previous son, Khalid, who’s on the autism spectrum and is non-verbal.
“He is been round his father little or no however he actually loves him,” Ms Seif says. “He has pictures of him and if anybody says he seems to be like him, Khalid will go over to the picture and level to him. They’ve a robust bond.”
She hopes they’ll rebuild their lives within the security of Britain, if the starvation strike succeeds.
“I am very happy with Alaa for preventing like this,” she says. “However I am scared to lose him. We simply need to stay a traditional life as a household now.”