For decades State Security officers have crossed all red lines. Now is the time to ponder their future, writes Nesmahar Sayed The demonstrations that eventually toppled president Hosni Mubarak began on 25 January, National Police Day. The date was no accident. The organisers of the protest were sending a clear message: notice was being served on the activities of the agencies that made up the regime's security apparatus. For years they had acted with impunity. Human rights groups had repeatedly raised concern over extra-judicial killings, disappearances and the wholesale torture of detainees. Invariably they met with obfuscation from the regime's henchmen. So pervasive were the activities of Egypt's intelligence and security agencies that the public believed nothing could happen in the country without their first giving the go ahead. "It was a myth patched together from two directions. The security agencies exercised their seemingly limitless power with a chilling swagger, while the public obeyed its orders either to further their own interests, or from fear," says Ahmed Seif, a lawyer at the Hisham Mubarak Centre for Legal Aid. The myth has now been shattered. State Security Intelligence (SSI) officers are no longer the lords of all they survey. On Monday the prosecutor-general announced that 47 SSI officers were being investigated on suspicion of destroying State Security documents. It is the first victory of a campaign launched last week on Facebook calling on citizens to demonstrate in front of buildings belonging to Amn Al-Dawla (SSI) to demand the dismantling of the notorious agency. Events began to move quickly when prime minister Ahmed Shafik was forced to resign ahead of mass demonstrations called for last Friday. His replacement, Essam Sharaf, went to meet the protesters in Tahrir Square and vowed to reign in State Security. By Friday evening Alexandria's SSI headquarters had been stormed by protesters who said they were seeking to prevent SSI officers from destroying documentary evidence of their crimes. Earlier in the day plumes of smoke had been seen coming from the building, a sign that documents were being burned. There was, too, an element of revenge in the storming of a building in which many activists had been held under emergency laws and tortured. SSI, which falls under the Ministry of Interior, has long been viewed as the scariest of Egypt's three intelligence agencies, attracting far more criticism than General Intelligence, which is attached to the presidency, and Military Intelligence, attached to the Ministry of Defence. Its mandate covered domestic security but, says Nasser Amin, a lawyer at the International Criminal Court, for decades it had confused the security of the state with that of the regime. "For the last 11 years it has operated to the benefit of Gamal Mubarak, focussing its attention on suppressing any opposition to the inheritance scenario. It is this misdirection of its resources that has led to demands the entire institution be dismantled." But that, Fouad Allam, former deputy chief of State Security, told Al-Ahram Weekly, is impossible. Every state, he says, has its security agencies. But not all of them operate with the impunity that SSI enjoyed, detaining and torturing at whim. True, says Allam, who admits that human rights violations did occur. He insists, however, that many officers who violated the human rights were brought to justice. The problem is, he says, that the public could not be told of this "because of the secrecy of the agency's work". An SSI officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, argues that the agency's main focus never deviated from intelligence gathering. Skipping over the techniques used to gather that intelligence, he points out that information was first analysed then forwarded to the agency's head. It would then be submitted to the minister of interior, who was responsible for briefing the president. "Our main role was to sift raw information for its security implications," he says. "Unfortunately the regime increasingly viewed social and economic problems as security issues and looked for security, rather than political solutions. Many State Security reports mentioned the corruption of ministers and other public figures. It was the political leadership that dealt arrogantly with such issues, sweeping them under the carpet." So did State Security officers destroy documents? "Yes we did," he answers. "The moment we received information that our buildings would be attacked we started burning documents. It's not difficult to understand. It is the ABC of intelligence work." When former Interior Minister Mahmoud Wagdi froze the activities of SSI discussions at last began about how the agency could be reformed. "I try to be as objective as I can on the issue," says leading Muslim Brotherhood member Essam El-Erian. "Certainly hearings need to be held to formulate the future role and working methods of the agency." In doing so, he suggests, it would be useful to examine the experience of other countries where the security service also span out of control and had to be dragged back on track. (see p.3)
