The International Coalition for Filmmakers at Risk (ICFR) has renewed its demand for Egyptian authorities to “immediately and unconditionally” release film producer Moataz Abdelwahab.
The Egyptian film producer Moataz Abdelwahab disappeared on 5 May 2020 from his office in Cairo. Six days later he re-appeared for a hearing at the Supreme Court for State Security, where he was accused of “partnering with a terrorist organisation” and “spreading false news”. Since then, he has been in pre-trial detention for almost two years.
Moataz Abdelwahab (43) produced Egypt’s official 2021 Oscars submission When We’re Born (2019) by director Tamer Izzat, which played at the El Gouna International Film Festival and Les Journées Cinématographique de Cartage 2019, as well as a number of documentaries, among them Khan’s Fingerprints, a portrait of the prominent Egyptian director Mohammad Khan, The Heart of Cairo which examines the history of the city, and most recently A Curfew, by renowned Egyptian filmmaker Amir Ramses, that just won 12 awards from the Egyptian Film Association.
“We call on the Egyptian authorities to immediately and unconditionally release Moataz Abdelwahab and we encourage all film and culture institutions around the world to do the same,” says the ICFR statement.
Adds Mike Downey, ICFR board member and chairman of the European Film Academy: “The ongoing crackdown on dissent in Egypt has long targeted artists, musicians filmmakers, along with opposition and political figures, journalists and members of the LGBT community, crushing freedom of expression and creativity. Moataz Abdelwahab is an unfortunate victim of this crackdown.
“The space for freedom of artistic expression has been shrinking under Sisi’s rule (Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, President of Egypt), as witnessed by the death of filmmaker Shady Habash who died inside Cairo’s Tora prison complex in 2020, having made a video critical of the regime.”
