CAIRO: Egyptian authorities have arrested journalist Karim Asaad after his fact-checking service had published articles accusing officials of involvement in smuggling cash, weapons and gold to Zambia, the publication said on Sunday.

Asaad was apprehended at his home in Greater Cairo early on Saturday following questioning over coverage of the case, said a statement from an independent website Matsada2sh.

His arrest brings the number of journalists behind bars in the Arab world’s most populous nation to 24, according to Egypt’s national press union.

“Our colleague, journalist Karim Asaad… was arrested after security forces dressed in civilian clothes stormed his home” at 1:00am on Saturday (2200 GMT on Friday), said Matsada2sh.

“They physically assaulted his wife, threatened their young child, raided the apartment, and then led him away, forcefully disappeared, to an undisclosed location.” The syndicate of Egyptian journalists has called on authorities to “free” Asaad and to “disclose his current location”.

There was no immediate official comment, but on Sunday evening the union’s president, Khaled Elbalshy, said on Facebook he had “contacted the authorities” and that Asaad “is doing okay” and “will return home in the coming hours”.

According to the Matsada2sh statement, “before his arrest, the only questions the assailants asked our colleague were related to our breaking coverage of the Zambia-Egypt plane story”.

The southern African country’s Drug Enforcement Commission on Tuesday announced its officers had seized “a chartered aircraft carrying dangerous goods” at Lusaka airport.

The plane was carrying nearly $5.7 million as well as pistols, ammunition, and 127 kilos of “suspected gold”, according to the statement.

The Zambian authorities have arrested 10 suspects, nine of them foreigners, it said.

Lawyers’ documents in Lusaka note that at least five Egyptians have been detained.

‘Don’t believe’

Egyptian state media claimed the aircraft in question was privately owned and that it only transited through Cairo.

“So far, the only reaction from the government was to arrest… one of the only sources of information on this topic,” argued activist Lobna Darwish of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights in a social media post.

Matsda2sh, whose Arabic name translates into “Don’t believe”, was founded in London in 2018 by the late Egyptian journalist Mohamed Aboul Gheit.

Published in Dawn, August 21st, 2023