CAIRO: Egypt’s politically active blogger community has brought to light another torture case against the regime’s security services amid a rising tide of outrage over police brutality.

On Saturday, lawyers from the Association for Human Rights and Legal Aid (AHRLA) will go to court in a last-ditch effort to keep alive the case against a state security officer accused of torturing to death a man he arrested three and a half years ago.The case against Captain Ashraf Safwat is gaining new attention following the decision by Egypt’s activist blogger community to post the details online in the wake of several other cases of police brutality in recent weeks.

“The most significant aspect of the case is this is the first state security officer to truly be put in front of a criminal court,” said Mohsen Bahnasi, a member of AHRLA’s board, referring to the country’s feared plainclothes security service.

Mohammed Abdel Qader and his brother were summoned to a Cairo police station on Sept 16, 2003, by Safwat. Abdel Qader died five days later and an autopsy gave torture by electric shock combined with a weak heart as the cause of death.

More than three years later, the case continues to drag on, hampered by slow prosecutors, uncooperative security services and now the family’s decision to drop the case and disappear.

In the past few months, however, torture cases have gained new prominence in Egypt as bloggers have posted videos, photos and accounts of brutality in police stations, prompting renewed investigations.

On Jan 20, Abdel Qader’s case appeared on a blog featuring excerpts from the forensic report and gruesome autopsy pictures showing the mangled corpse of a heavily bearded man.

“There is evidence of the application of high temperature to the right and left breast,” read an excerpt. “He was subject to those injuries hours before his death.” “The pictures have done something, because they are visual – it is a shock,” said Aida Seif al-Dawla, a veteran anti-torture activist who credits the bloggers for raising public awareness on the pervasive use of torture by security services. Hossam el-Hamalawy, on whose Arabawy blog the pictures appear, said it comes as no surprise bloggers should take interest in such cases.

“The bloggers themselves were victims of torture during the past years,” he said, referring to the case of Mohammed al-Sharqawi who was allegedly sodomised after being arrested. “We are receiving so many videos now.” Bloggers came to public attention during the political ferment surrounding elections in 2005.—AFP