CAIRO, Sept 28: An appeals court on Sunday ordered outspoken Egyptian editor Ibrahim Eissa to be jailed for two months for writing rumours about President Hosni Mubarak’s health, a judicial source said.

“The appeals court ordered him jailed for two months,” the source said, asking not to be named.

Eissa, editor-in-chief of the independent Al-Dustur daily, was charged with spreading “false information... damaging the public interest and national stability,” and had faced up to three years in prison.

The verdict followed an initial ruling in March which ordered him jailed for six months.

Eissa was at home in Cairo when the verdict was announced.

“This judgment opens the gates of hell for the Egyptian press and confirms the state’s hostile position towards freedom of opinion and expression,” he told AFP by telephone.

“The big problem is that we are faced with a failing regime which reacts in a schizophrenic way. The regime doesn’t stop talking about freedom of the press and jails journalists” at the same time.

“This verdict isn’t just about freedom of the press and freedom in this country. This proves that anything concerning the president is a sacred and untouchable matter.

“In this country it’s normal for journalists to be jailed while businessmen are freed,” he said, in apparent reference to the acquittal in August of five defendants over a 2006 ferry sinking in which more than 1,000 people died.

Eissa said he had spoken to the head of the journalists’ union, Makram Mohammed Ahmed, who said that he would ask the prosecutor to delay carrying out the sentence.

The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information said on Saturday it hoped Mubarak would use his authority “to end the trial as he did several times by pardon or retrial.” —AFP