CAIRO: A leading youth movement condemned an Egyptian police raid on the offices of Al Jazeera's Egypt unit on Sunday, which saw security forces confiscate equipment and arrest a broadcast engineer. The April 6 Movement's spokesperson Mahmoud Afif said the raid comes after the ruling military junta ended all work permits for satellite channels working in the country and ordered police to end the broadcasting of any such channel that continues working without official permission. The government has said such channels are “inciters of violence.” Al Jazeera has worked in Egypt for several years with work permits, and when it requested to renew its license, the government told staff to continue working until the issuance of a new permit, Afif added. “What happened today was the continuation of a string of decisions the SCAF and the government began to practice after the revolution. These decisions include criminalizing the right to demonstrate peacefully and participate in peaceful sit-ins,” Afif said. An Al Jazeera International's producer in Cairo, Adam Makary, said via Twitter, “Security forces have stormed in the AJ Mubashir Masr office.” According to Makary, the English language staff left early on Sunday afternoon, but the Arabic staff remained. It is not the first time Egyptian security have attempted to force Al Jazeera to shutdown. During the Mubarak regime, the network was barred from reporting in the country after Cairo did not approve of their coverage of events in the country. BM
