Judges unite A DELEGATION representing the Cairo Judges Club attended an Iftar on Saturday at the headquarters of the Alexandria Judges Club in what observers said was an attempt to unify ranks before a possibly heated general assembly in November. Club Chairman Zakaria Abdel-Aziz called upon judges to attend the assembly and to "stand alert to whoever attempts to weaken their unity". The November gathering will discuss how to reply to the decree passed last week by Justice Minister Mamdouh Marei abrogating the ministry's contract with a number of hospitals and providing healthcare to judges but with the ministry bearing a certain percentage of the expenses. Marei said that members of the Administrative Prosecution Authority and the State Jurisdiction Body would only slightly benefit from the ministry's health services fund. As a result, Marei said it was necessary to decrease the services provided judges "to give others an equal opportunity". Observers suggested the minister's latest decree was yet another attempt to undermine the clubs and silence outspoken judges. Last year, Marei suspended the financial aid which the ministry gave annually to judges clubs. The decision forced the clubs to increase their membership fees to offset the suspension of assistance. Teachers deported TWENTY-seven female Egyptian teachers were deported from Dhahran in Saudi Arabia after being accused of forging work permits and health certificates. An investigation into the legal status of another 209 teachers is underway, writes Reem Leila. Ahmed El-Quesni, assistant foreign minister for consular affairs, said the teachers were given a suspended sentence between one and three years in prison and fined up to 10,000 Saudi riyals after being accused of forging their university degrees and work permits in Saudi Arabia. At a press conference, El-Quesni said there was still one teacher being investigated but that she was not being detained. He said Saudi officials were currently looking into how the Saudi Ministry of Education had allowed teachers to work with forged documents. "The Saudi authorities said they had uncovered a number of similar cases over the past four years. Most of the forged degrees come from various Egyptian universities," El-Quesni said. He added that the ministry will be following up on the investigation with the remaining teachers accused of forging their work permits. Surprisingly innocent THE MAN who had been accused of raping an 11-year-old girl has been cleared of the charge. Hend Mohamed, who recently gave birth to a girl, had accused Mohamed Sami of raping her. She said that almost a year ago, the 23-year-old tok-tok driver threatened her with a knife while she was on her way to a youth club to pick up her younger brother, then raped her. But on Sunday the Criminal Court, using DNA evidence, ruled that Sami was not the rapist. "The case is not easy because the key evidence is the DNA which proved that Sami was not the father," Hend's lawyer said. "Also the confusion in her testimony to the police created a big gap that any defence lawyer could use in his or her client's favour." Mohamed's birth certificate says she was born in 1995 which would make her 12 and an examination of her bones and teeth say she is between 15 and 16. Her lawyer, however, says that since Mohamed's birth certificate is computerised "it could not be forged." In the courtroom after the verdict was announced, Sami's mother fainted and his relatives cheered, "Long live justice." "Thank God, Sami has survived Hend's trap," his mother said. On the other hand, silence on the part of the Mohamed family greeted the pronouncement, save for Hend who screamed after the verdict was read; she continued to scream when her father began hitting her. Hend and her family refused to be interviewed by the media as they left the courthouse. Mohamed's lawyer said Egyptian law allows for an appeal.
