CAIRO: The administrative court overturned Tuesday a decision by the Central Auditing Agency (CAA) to monitor the financial and administrative records of privately owned newspapers. The head of the Cairo Administrative Court Mohamed Ahmed Attiya in his ruling stressed that freedom of the press is enshrined in the Egyptian constitution, and that imposing restrictions on it in any way goes against the spirit of freedom of expression, which should not be hampered by any law. Hamdy El-Assiouty from the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information told Daily News Egypt, "We have a constitution that protects freedom of expression and unfortunately we have restrictions on the articles that specifically protect these freedoms. This is a good decision which gives independence to newspapers. Is it not enough that they monitor newspapers before and after they are issued? It's a step forward; we don't need more restrictions of this sort. Attiya also referred Article 33 of the press law - which gives the CAA the right to monitor private newspapers - to the Supreme Constitutional Court to decide whether the law was constitutionally sound or not. "Article 33 now has an unconstitutional tint, the ruling has cast doubt on it, El Assiouty said, "these are private newspapers, not party papers, so they aren't financed by any government bodies. You have a press law that monitors these things, so why should the CAA get involved? The CAA had been taken to court over its decision by editor-in-chief of Al-Khamis newspaper Amr Al-Laithy, who also filed charges against Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif and CAA head Gamal El-Malt. Al-Laithy stated that this was a restriction on freedom of the press and newspapers should not be forced to submit annual financial records to the CAA, nor cede any control to the agency in any capacity. Newspaper editors welcomed the court decision, with Al-Osboa editor-in-chief Moustafa Bakri quoted in Al-Masry Al-Youm as saying, "We already have enough laws restricting freedom of the press. Why do you want to put new obstacles?
