UK should impose sanctions on Egypt over jailed activist, says Helena Kennedy | Egypt

The UK government should impose sanctions on key figures in the Egyptian government in response to its refusal to release the British-Egyptian human rights activist Alaa Abd el-Fattah, Labour’s most prominent human rights lawyer has proposed.

Writing in the Guardian, Helena Kennedy called for the UK to take the case to the international court of justice, as France has recently done in the case of a national held by Iran.

Lady Kennedy said the moves were necessary as Abd el-Fattah’s 69-year-old mother, Leila Soueif, enters the 243rd day of her hunger strike at St Thomas’ hospital in London. She started the strike to secure either British consular access to her son or his release. Doctors have told the family she is at risk of sudden death, but her body has also adapted to months…