Khaberni -Egyptians await the final ratification of the new Criminal Procedures Law which regulates the criminal process from the arrest of the accused to the issuance of final verdicts, while the United Nations and rights groups have warned about the law.
The Criminal Procedures Law along with the Penal Code are considered cornerstone elements of the justice system and are described by legal experts as complementing the constitution.
Over the past years, the parliament has reviewed two drafts of the law presented by the government, and settled on a version presented by a specially formed parliamentary subcommittee whose head confirmed that the law represents "a true shift in the human rights file."
The head of the parliamentary subcommittee for studying and redrafting the law, Ehab Al-Tamawi, said that the draft law "introduces a set of new guarantees... regarding the reorganization of the Public Prosecution's role and the reorganization of the right to defense," in addition to matters related to pretrial detention and travel bans.
Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Badr Abdel Ati assured the United Nations during the Universal Periodic Review of human rights that the new law would create a "legislative revolution in the field of criminal justice in Egypt especially regarding the durations and controls of pretrial detention."
Among the criticized aspects, one provision allows the Public Prosecution, "in urgent cases," to order travel bans indefinitely and without waiting for a judicial ruling, and another permits security forces to enter homes and conduct searches without judicial permission "in cases of danger or distress," without a clear definition of such circumstances.
Balance of powers
In recent years, Egypt has faced criticism for passing legislation that legalizes exceptional procedures dating back to the state of emergency that lasted for decades under successive regimes, until it was ended in 2021.
In April, the parliament sent a final version of the law, not yet published, to the presidency for final ratification.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk urged President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to "carefully consider" the draft law "before granting any approval... in order to ensure its full compliance with Egypt's international obligations in the field of human rights."
Egypt ranks 135th out of 142 on the Rule of Law Index of the World Justice Project, an international non-governmental organization concerned with justice and the rule of law.
Karim Anara, the director of research at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights explains that the draft law expands the powers granted to both the Public Prosecution and the police at the expense of other judicial bodies and at the expense of the accused and their lawyers.
Prominent lawyer Khaled Ali warns that the draft law would diminish the role of lawyers and undermine the rights of defense "which are a fundamental guarantee for any fair trial."
He adds that the text "does not genuinely combat corruption, expands the powers granted to the police and the prosecution... and does not achieve the balance supposed between different judicial bodies."
The new law also grants the Public Prosecution the right to withhold witnesses or conduct investigations in the absence of lawyers, and it does not obligate it to inform the defense about the case files, which are repeated violations according to Anara, but they will become, if the law is passed, legal practices.
Anara states that remote trials are performed "hastily," between the judge on one side and dozens of defendants on the other side of the virtual conversation, barely able to hear the rulings and decisions that affect dozens of detainees.
Pretrial detention
Mahmoud Shelbey, a researcher on Egypt at Amnesty International, believes that the new law has not resolved "the most controversial issues in the Egyptian criminal justice system.
Amnesty International stated in October, that the draft law "does not provide any safeguards against long-term and arbitrary pretrial detention."
Although the new law reduces the maximum limit for pretrial detention from 24 to 18 months, it does not end the "recycling of accused" according to Shelbey.
Shelbey explains that in this case, the Egyptian authorities deliberately list names of those whose detention period has ended in new cases with identical charges to those they were detained for, allowing new periods of pretrial detention to begin.
Shelbey also warns of another problem with the draft law: it does not allow the accused to seek legal recourse "in cases of excesses during their arrest or during detention" as it confines this right to the Public Prosecution.
In the face of criticism, the parliament held a "community dialogue" to discuss the draft law, yet it rejected the majority of the suggestions presented, according to Shelbey, Anara, and Ali.
Anara described the community dialogue as being a "one-sided conversation," while Ali, in collaboration with a group of 15 independent lawyers, submitted a paper titled "Towards a Fair Law on Criminal Procedures" which included amendments to the articles of the law "and the parliament did not consider any of our proposals out of the total 540 articles," as clarified by France Press.
