IBRAHIM
METWALLY HEGAZY
Egyptian human rights lawyer detained at Cairo airport in September 2017 while travelling to brief the UN on enforced disappearances. Held in pre-trial detention for over eight years through serial case-rotation.
- Country
- Egypt
- Role
- Lawyer
- Arrested
- 10 Sep 2017
- Sentence
- No verdict — held in pre-trial detention for 8+ years through serial case rotation.
Silhouette in place of portrait. No image is published without explicit consent from the defender or their family.
Held without verdict for
Three thousand one hundred+ days.
Days in pre-trial detention since the morning of 10 September 2017. Counter live · updates daily at 00:00 UTC
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Case update
Son forcibly disappeared
Ibrahim's son Amr Ibrahim Metwally was forcibly disappeared during the Republican Guard dispersal, prompting Ibrahim's years-long search for answers and his founding of the Association of the Families of the Forcibly Disappeared.
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Arrest
Detained at Cairo airport en route to UN Working Group
Officers stopped him at passport control as he was leaving to brief the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances. He was held incommunicado for two days and reportedly subjected to electric shocks.
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Case update
Charged under State Security Case 900/2017
He was formally accused of joining a terrorist group and communicating with foreign entities, and ordered into pre-trial detention at Tora 2.
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Case update
Rotated into Case 1470/2019 as detention limit approached
As his two-year pre-trial detention limit approached, prosecutors added him to a second case file with identical charges, restarting the clock.
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Case update
Rotated again into Case 786/2020
A third case was opened against him, again on substantively identical terrorism charges, extending his detention beyond constitutional limits.
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Case update
Family requests transfer for urgent surgery
After doctors recommended an operation, his family petitioned the prosecution for a hospital transfer from Badr 3 prison. No response was received.
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Case update
First trial session opens after eight years in detention
For the first time since his 2017 arrest, he appeared before a judge in a substantive trial hearing in one of the three cases. A second case opened ten days later.
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Case update
UN High Commissioner names him in call for release of long-held detainees
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a public statement demanding the release of all detainees in Egypt held beyond statutory pre-trial limits, citing his case.
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Case update
Eighth anniversary of his detention approaches; trials continue
Hearings in the rotated cases continue without conclusion. He remains in Badr 3 prison, still without a verdict and still without the medical care recommended in 2024.
Approved
The arrest, and what followed.
Background and work
Ibrahim Metwally Hegazy is a Cairo lawyer who turned to human rights work after his son Amr disappeared during the police violence that followed the 2013 dispersal of Rabaa Square. He co-founded the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms (ECRF) and the Association of the Families of the Disappeared, two of the only Egyptian organisations systematically documenting cases of enforced disappearance and assisting families in their search.
Arrest and detention
On 10 September 2017, he was stopped at Cairo International Airport on his way to Geneva, where he had been invited to address the 113th session of the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances. Officers from the National Security Agency took him into custody, held him incommunicado for two days, and reportedly tortured him. He was subsequently charged in connection with State Security Case 900/2017 and placed in pre-trial detention at the high-security Tora 2 prison.
Conviction and imprisonment
For more than seven years he has not been tried. Each time he has approached the legal limit on pre-trial detention, prosecutors have "rotated" him into a new case file with fresh — but substantively identical — accusations: case 1470/2019, then 786/2020, and most recently a third file. His first trial session in any of the three cases finally took place on 1 June 2025, with a second case opening on 11 June. Hearings continue. He has been held throughout in Badr 3 prison, where his family has repeatedly sought, and been denied, a transfer for urgent surgery.
Current status as of 2026
Now 61, he remains in pre-trial detention in Badr 3 with multiple untreated medical conditions. In August 2025 the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights expressly called for the release of all Egyptian detainees held beyond statutory pre-trial limits and named him among them. The Egyptian government has not responded. His case has become emblematic of the practice of "rotation" — the indefinite holding of dissidents through serial recycling of identical charges.
Sources on file with HuMENA EditorialReading time · 6 minutes
"I went to speak about the disappeared. They made me one of them."HuMENA Editorial · 2026
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Compiled by HuMENA's Egypt research team from primary documentation, public filings, family-supplied legal documents, and confidential partner reporting. Editorial responsibility: HuMENA Editorial Board.
Editorial sign-off · published