The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN) and the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) cordially invite you to attend a press conference to announce the
EMHRN’s annual report on the right to freedom of association.
The 100-page report provides a review of the situation of non-governmental human rights organizations in 11 countries north and south of the Mediterranean in 2009.
The report findings indicate that the right to form and establish associations in Arab Mediterranean countries is undergoing further deterioration and decline, in comparison with the situation in 2008. The report exposes the constraints and violations against civil society activists, amounting in some countries to physical assault, administrative detention and fabrication of criminal charges, as is the case in Tunisia and Syria, as well as legal restrictions and administrative arbitrariness in countries including Jordan, Egypt and Algeria.
The report also reveals the growing role of "fake" non-governmental organizations (commonly referred to as government-operated non-governmental organizations (GONGO)) on the national and international levels (e.g. in the United Nations).
The Cairo launch of the report is significant considering the forthcoming Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the Egypt Country Report on the situation of human rights. The UPR will be held at the UN Human Rights Council. This year’s report includes a specific chapter on Egypt, outlining the arbitrary actions taken by administrative and security agencies against human rights organizations that have been relentlessly engaged with exposing violations of human rights including cases of torture and administrative detention as well as inhumane and degrading treatment of citizens.
The press conference will be held on Wednesday, January 13th, at 10:30am in Dr. Mohammed Al-Sayed Saeed Hall at the new CIHRS headquarters: 21 Abdel-Majid Ramalli, Bab El-Louk, next to the Chamber of Commerce building, the seventh roundabout.
Speakers :

Mr. Marc Schade-Poulsen EMHRN Executive Director,
Mr. Wadih Al-Asmar, EMHRN Executive Committee Member,
Mr. Moataz El-Fegiery, the Executive director of CIHRS, and EMHRN Executive Committee Member,
Mr. Thibaut Guillet, Freedom of Association Project Coordinator

A thirty-minute reception will follow the press conference.
*Simultaneous interpretation for Arabic and English will be provided.