Living Archive
Defenders.
An open record of human rights defenders across the Middle East and North Africa. Every entry is a case file — dated, sourced, and kept current.
173
Records on
the open archive
87
Currently held
detained · sentenced · on trial
57
In exile or under
transnational repression
11
In memoriam
killed for their work
The Record
Filtered cases
Sanaa Seif
Sanaa Seif was abducted in June 2020 outside the prosecutor's office where she had gone to file a complaint after being assaulted.…
Ahmed Samir Santawy
Ahmed Samir Santawy, a graduate student researching women's reproductive rights in Egypt, was sentenced to four years in prison by an emergency…
Hunger strikeAmal Fathy
Women's rights defender sentenced to prison for criticising Egypt's failure to protect women from sexual harassment. Convicted on false-news and insult charges…
Ali Akram al-Bayati
Ali Akram al-Bayati, a physician and former IHCHR Commissioner, faces defamation charges for documenting torture claims while serving Iraq's national human rights…
Husain Mouneif al-Jabri
Arrested in 2012 and sentenced to ten years in the UAE84 trial, Husain Mouneif al-Jabri completed his term in 2022 but was…
Nashwa Al-Deeb
Opposition candidate who withdrew from Egypt's November 2025 parliamentary elections citing electoral fraud, vote-buying, and systematic irregularities in the Munira and Giza…
Mohamed Mahmoud Ebrahim Shahin
An imam and community mediator in Turin for two decades, Mohamed Shahin faces deportation to Egypt after Italy revoked his residence permit…
Abd Al Hamid Goura
Head of the Laghouat section of the Algerian League for the Defence of Human Rights, Abd Al Hamid Goura was arrested at…
Malcolm Bidali
A Kenyan security guard and blogger detained in Qatar for documenting migrant worker rights abuses. Held in solitary confinement for nearly a…
Magdy Abdel Hamid
Chairman of EACPE, Magdy Abdel Hamid was barred from travel in 2016 even after charges in the foreign funding case were dropped.…
Ezzat Ghoneim
Ezzat Ghoneim, a lawyer who led one of Egypt's most active human rights groups documenting disappearances, was himself disappeared in 2018, then…
Hossam Bahgat
Hossam Bahgat is a journalist and human rights monitor whose investigative reporting has made him a recurring target of Egypt's security apparatus.…
