CAIRO: Reporters Without Borders (RSP) released a statement on Saturday calling for the release of an Egyptian blogger who was sentenced three years in jail. The blogger Mikael Nabil Sanad began his hunger strike on the August 23 and has since garnered media attention. He has also recently stopped drinking, leading the RWB to fear that he may soon die. “The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces would have to take full responsibility. Held for exercising his right to freedom of expression,” the statement read. “Sanad must not become the symbol of a repressive and unjust post-Mubarak Egypt.” Sanad was convicted in April by the military court on charges of insulting the armed forces. This has prompted US lawmakers to write letters to the Egyptian military ruler, Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, demanding his release. The military has denied Nabil's status as a “prisoner of conscience” stating that he has the right to appeal his conviction. “What Nabil wrote on his blog is unrelated to opinion; it was a clear transgression of all boundaries of insult and libel, and the manufacturing of lies against the armed forces,” the official MENA news agency quoted a military official as saying. According to the official, Nabil also called for people to resist the mandatory draft service which affects most men in Egypt. BM
