Mother's 81-day hunger strike after son jailed for sharing Facebook post
Laila Soueif told Yahoo News she was 'doing what any mother would' after her son was jailed in Egypt.
A mother who has been on hunger strike for 81 days protesting against her son's detention in an Egyptian prison says she is doing "what any mother would" to protect her child.
Laila Soueif, who consumes nothing more than hydration salts, water and tea with sweetener, has lost more than 20kg since 30 October, when she began fighting for her son, Alaa Abdel Fattah, to be freed.
Renowned political activist and writer Fattah was imprisoned in Egypt in 2021 for allegedly "spreading false news" after he shared a Facebook post about police brutality.
The British-Egyptian national has been accused of a string of offences by the Egyptian authorities in recent years, including for his role in the 25 January Revolution of 2011.
He was set to be released from Wadi El-Natrun prison on 29 September, but, to the horror of his mother, continues to be detained.
While foreign secretary David Lammy said he is focused on bringing about Fattah's release "as quickly as possible", Amnesty International said it is "extremely concerned" that "successive UK governments" haven't done enough to secure his freedom.
Lammy his case as recently as 20 December, the prime minister’s official spokesman said.
Sir Keir Starmer confirmed on Monday that he will raise the case of Fattah in his next talks with Egyptian president Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.
Asked whether the prime minister would raise the case in his next meeting with the Egyptian president, the spokesman said: “I don’t know when those next talks will be, but yes – as he has done previously.”
'If I don't do this, who the hell will?'
Soueif, herself a venerated human rights and women's rights activist, first went on hunger strike to draw attention to her son's plight in 2014, stopping the campaign on the 76th day.
Now, entering her 81st day with no signs of stopping, she is in new, unchartered territory.
Standing outside the Foreign Office, where she has marked the ground with a tally totalling her days on strike, Soueif, who is 68, speaks quietly, but firmly.
While her movements are slow, and she stops to pause for breath, she is stoic and self-deprecating.
"I’m still at the stage where my body is burning surplus fat. I’m lucky I had some body fat to burn through to begin with," she joked.
"I kept on thinking, ‘if I don’t do this, who the hell will?’”
"I sincerely believe that most mothers would do what I’m doing to protect their sons and their grandsons, their children and their grandchildren. That’s who I am. That’s who we are," she added.
David Lammy, who actively called for the government to bring about Fattah's release while he was in opposition, is now tasked with taking action.
This week, over 100 MPs wrote to Lammy to urge him to use his influence to secure Fattah's release.
While the family met with the foreign secretary in November, Soueif said nothing is happening fast enough.
"The UK government has expressed sympathy. But you don’t need sympathy from the government, you need action — concrete action," Soueif told Yahoo News.
No fresh air or sunlight for five years
Fattah, who was named the PEN writer of courage award earlier this year for his work defending freedom of expression, has been denied access to fresh air and sunlight for the past five years. He is only allowed to exercise in an indoor hall.
Added to this, he has been denied access to a lawyer, as well as consular visits from British authorities.
Soueif last checked in with her son at the end of November.
She is allowed to visit him once a month, for no longer than 20 minutes, speaking to him through a phone and separated by a pane of glass.
"You can't do much in 20 minutes beyond reassuring him," she said. "You don’t get to touch him or hug him. They get to record absolutely everything you’re saying."
Soueif said her son's spirits are "incredibly low".
“When I last saw him, he really didn’t think he was ever getting out of prison,” she added.
Amnesty International, who is supporting the family, said it is "extremely concerned" that "successive UK governments" haven't done enough to defend Fattah's rights and secure his freedom "simply for expressing peaceful views".
“This is part of a pattern where arbitrarily-imprisoned UK nationals have failed to get the ministerial attention they desperately need," Freshta Sharif, Amnesty International UK’s government and political relations adviser, told Yahoo News.
“We need to see the government now genuinely prioritising diplomatic efforts to get Alaa out of jail and safely out of the country, and this should be part of a new government strategy for how it responds to the plight of UK nationals arbitrarily detained overseas.”
“This is a distressing situation with so many deeply regrettable elements - Laila shouldn’t be in this terrible predicament, her son shouldn’t have been jailed in the first place, and the UK government shouldn’t need to be pushed to do the right thing on behalf of an arbitrarily-jailed UK national," Sharif added.
An FCDO spokesperson said: “Our priority remains securing the release of Mr El-Fattah so he can be reunited with his family. We continue to raise his case at the highest levels of the Egyptian Government.
“The Foreign Secretary has raised Mr El-Fattah’s case with Egyptian Foreign Minister Abdelatty on multiple occasions, most recently on 25 November, and the Minister for Development raised it with Foreign Minister Abdelatty just earlier this month.”
