The UN summit on the environment will be held from November 6 to 18. For days, Sharm el-Sheikh, scene of the event, has been guarded by police and plainclothes agents. All forms of dissent are suppressed, and at least 67 people have been arrested, including an Indian who had organized a march. A report denounces the “high risk” of food and water shortages in the Middle East.
Cairo () – The famous tourist destination of Sharm el-Sheikh was “militarized” and the security forces carried out a series of raids that culminated in the arrest of dozens of environmentalists and rights activists. Amid the imposition of security measures and a harsh crackdown on critical voices, Egypt prepares to host the UN Climate Change Conference (Cop27), which will be held at resorts overlooking the Red Sea from 6 to November 18.
Mohamed Lotfy, director of the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms (ECRF), reports that in recent days at least 67 people have been arrested in Cairo and other cities, who have appeared before the magistrate to answer for the summons to the protests organized for next November 11. Among those detained is an Indian activist (in the photo), who had organized a protest march for the climate and the environment starting from the Egyptian capital. Behind the repression of the authorities there is also another interest hidden: to suppress any form of dissent related to the demonstrations against the government, promoted by the actor, businessman and activist Mohamed Ali, currently in exile.
Among the reasons for the arrest is the accusation of spreading false news on social networks, in reference to the protest demonstrations. Local sources also speak of an increase in random checks by security departments and plainclothes agents who confiscate (and search) mobile phones and social media accounts. Despite the consultations, the Egyptian Ministry of the Interior did not want to comment on the issue and there was even silence among the organizers of the UN climate conference.
In Egypt, public protests are prohibited and dissent is punished by force. This has been the case since the overthrow of Muslim Brotherhood leader and former president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 at the hands of then-army commander – and now head of state – Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who assumed the presidency the following year. The repression affects both the leaders and supporters of the Brotherhood as well as ordinary citizens and activists.
The Egyptian head of Cop27 said protests would be allowed in designated areas of Sharm el-Sheikh during the summit, but activists raised concerns about possible repression and rights violations. A fear confirmed by the growing “militarization” of the resort town overlooking the Red Sea, which now looks more like a war zone with checkpoints, checkpoints and agents everywhere than the global center of the climate debate. Behind the massive deployment is the fear that the UN event dedicated to the environment could be exploited for internal protests against the government or on a global scale.
Regarding the environment, on the eve of the summit, Greenpeace published a report in which it speaks of the “other risk”: water and food shortages in the Middle East, due to increasingly frequent heat waves and climate change . Entitled “Living on The Edge”, the study focuses on Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and highlights –like others in the recent past– that the region is warming at twice the global average rate, making its food and water supplies “extremely vulnerable”.
Finally, in the days leading up to Cop27, Unicef also unveiled a new project based on the so-called “Children’s Climate Risk Index (CRI)” from the Middle East and North Africa region. In this sense, Egypt is the country with the highest score in terms of the exposure of children to climatic and environmental disturbances, with more than 5.3 million people suffering the effects of heat waves. In addition, projections indicate that by 2050, at least four countries – Egypt, Djibouti, Yemen and Sudan – will have more than 103 million children and 53.5 million adolescents more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. The country of the pharaohs has an “extremely high” risk index.
