The shockingly flimsy case against the three international journalists from al-Jazeera’s English-language network, each jailed for seven years plus, is an indictment not just of Egypt’s disgraceful repudiation of freedom of the press, but the complete breakdown of any semblance of its rule of law. Currently an estimated 16,000 people – including at least 15 journalists – are in jail for political reasons, and hundreds on death row, most of them following similarly cursory trials. In the military crackdown on the Muslim Brotherood more than 1,000 have also been killed protesting.
The three respected journalists, Mohamed Fahmy, a Canadian of Egyptian descent who had worked for CNN and the New York Times, Peter Greste, an Australian who had worked for the BBC, and Baher Mohamed, an Egyptian, who had worked for the Japan's Asahi Shimbun, were accused of conspiring with the brotherhood to broadcast false reports of civil unrest. Prosecutors offered no public evidence either of support for the group or of any broadcasting inaccuracies. A group of students also got seven years each for assisting them, while Baher Mohamed, an extra three years for possession of a bullet casing souvenir.
Although the trial was specifically targeted at al-Jazeera, whose Qatari owners are seen by the military as supporters of the ousted Mohamed Morsi the prosecutions have already had a deeply chilling effect on the few local vestiges of an independent media and all opposition figures in Egypt.
They have rightly provoked widespread international protests, including from visiting US secretary of state John Kerry. Yet, while he condemned the sentences as "chilling and draconian", Kerry took care not to alienate the regime, regarded as a key regional ally, and made clear that US would soon resume its annual $1.3 billion in military aid. Sensitive to such nuances – some would say ambivalence – in the US approach President Abdel Fattah al Sisi was able to say on Tuesday with confidence that he would not interfere with the verdicts.