“If I had chosen not to talk, this could have happened to many Egyptian girls,” said the only young woman who decided to submit a complaint about the sexual abuse she and seven other women faced from military officers. Samira Ibrahim Mohamed decided to tell Human Rights Watch about the story of her sexual abuse in military prisons. Samira is a 25 year old who lives in Sohag and works as the director of a marketing department in a private company. Her political life started in her second year of secondary school (High School) when she chose to write about Israel in a composition question on her exam. “I came to Cairo, as any protester did, from Sohag to participate in the January 25 Revolution,” Samira said. Samira went to Tahrir Square and stood outside the press syndicate when someone asked why she was standing there, answering with, “I'm from Sohag and I just arrived, and now I am waiting for my relative to come and take me home.” She said she lied so she could participate in the revolution as did millions of Egyptians. Samira was in Tahrir Square on January 25 and protested with other demonstrators who faced beatings, water cannons, tasers and some even died. She was arrested on January 26 and released on January 27. Samira stood outside the museum, when an officer came to her. He welcomed her and said, “Hi Samira, come here.” When she got close to him he shocked her in her stomach. He detained her and accused other protestors of being arrested in a brothel. Officers beat the women's faces with shoes, tasered their bodies all over and poured water on them. They were placed in mini buses with other women arrested inside the museum. Women in black abbayas insulted army officers. Officers lined up the arrested men and women, forcing them to be photographed beside Molotov cocktails the officers had produced. They attempted to paint the women as prostitutes and the men as thugs. “We spent the night in minibuses being beaten and tasered by all the officers,” Samira said. In the morning, the minibuses moved until they arrived at the military prison. The women were moved out of the minibuses and again told to stand in a straight line. The officers told them to hand over their belongings, taking their national ID cards and all their money. “If we hear your voices, you will be buried here,” the officers told them. Samira noticed a recent photo of ousted President Hosni Mubarak behind them and asked, “Why is this picture here?” He insulted her and replied, “If you don't want him as your president…we want him and we love him.” “How many of you have bruises?” the officers asked. “All of us sir,” Samira answered. “We all have bruises from beatings and tasers.” Officers started taking them one by one to be inspected, until Samira's turn came. She entered a room with a large window enabling other officers to see her. She found a woman inside the room, who asked her to take off her clothes. Samira took off her jacket. The woman told her to take all her clothes off. Samira asked her to close the window and door so she can take off her clothes. The woman refused to close both and forced Samira to take all her clothes off, as Samira saw officers outside the room looking at her and laughing. “I wished I was dead at that moment,” she said. The officers divided them into two groups, sending them to two cells. Two officers entered the cell and told them to split into groups of virgins and non-virgins, telling them they would have to take virginity tests. Samira entered a room and a woman asked her to take off her clothes and lay on her back for the officer to examine her. When Samira asked the woman to send some of the officers in the examination room away, an officer tasered her in the stomach. Samira could not find any way to stop their brutal abuse other than by obeying orders. After the examination, the officer told her to sign a paper certifying the completion of the test. Samira said the Military prosecutor accused them of attempting to attack army officers during their work, possessing Ten Molotov cocktails and weapons other than firearms, causing traffic jams, smashing sidewalks, and breaking citizens' cars. She was also accused of breaking curfew, regardless of the fact she was arrested at 3:00pm. A judge accused Samira of the same charges. He asked her why she came from Sohag and why she participated in the revolution. Samira denied all the charges imposed on her by the judge, and she said the lawyers who were supposedly defending her were not. She added that she later learned that she had a suspended sentence of a year in prison. When she was released, she was transferred to hospital where she spent months recovering physically and psychologically. Samira said she submitted a report against her abusers, where she detailed what happened to her and to the other arrested women. Samira's lawyers submitted a complaint June 23 at the Military Prosecution's headquarters. The prosecutor summoned Samira to listen to her testimonies, and on March 10 the prosecution recalled the military prison's doctor. The doctor denied all of Samira's accusations, according to Tahrir diaries. Samira's lawyer Ahmed Hossam told Human Rights Watch that he was not allowed to attend the hearing with Samira. On May 30, a Major General in the military council who asked not to be mentioned told CNN the army did perform the virginity tests, where he said: “we were afraid the girls would say we raped them, so we wanted to prove that they were not virgins. These girls are not like my daughter or yours, they were prostitutes found in tents with protestors. We found drugs and Molotov cocktails in the tents as well.” After Samira's attempts to reveal the story of this crime to the public, she received many strange calls from private numbers threatening to kill her if she didn't stop exposing them by saying: “If you don't stop, you will meet Khaled Saeed's fate.” Lawyers at the Hisham Mubarak Law Center and El-Nadim Center filed two lawsuits for Samira, one of them before the State Council and the other before the Egyptian Administrative Court. Both lawsuits were to appeal against the slow military procedures in taking decisions against the military officers involved in the virginity tests crime at the military prison. There will supposedly be a second hearing on November 29 which will be against the administrative resolution to transfer Samira's case from civil court to military court. The final verdict concerning this case will be issued on December 13. Samira said by the end of her interview with Human Rights Watch she asked many movements and parties to help her with her case, but no one supported her or stood by her side. She said, “If I didn't tell the full story of what I had gone through, and kept it a secret like others, this would have happened to many Egyptian girls and women.” She also said, “I call on Egyptians to help women regain their rights.”
