CAIRO - His only crime was to have a camera. No, to be fair, not just a camera, but a journalist's ID card. Mohamed Gawdat works as a reporter and photojournalist at Rassd (RNN), an Egyptian news website, founded last year. He witnessed one of the latest clashes between demonstrators and policemen in Mohamed Mahmoud St., near the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior in downtown Cairo. During these clashes, after the massacre in Port Said, which left more than 70 dead and for which security men were apparently to blame, policemen shot tear gas and pellets at the demonstrators, who threw small stones back at them. Gawdat was wearing what is known as a Spanish mask, which he bought in Attaba for LE500 ($83), to protect him from the tear gas. He thought his job wouldn't be that dangerous, but he must have been dreaming. "I was in the front line facing the policemen, snapping photos. When they retreated, I moved forwards and vice versa," Gawdat told the Egyptian Mail. “Suddenly, a man standing near me was hit in the leg by a pellet. I wanted to carry on taking photos, so I showed the policemen my ID. "They told me to stand to one side and, regrettably, I took their advice," he added sadly. "I started taking pictures of two policemen standing on their armoured car, firing pellets at the demonstrators. “When they spotted what I was doing, they grabbed me, ripped off my mask, threw it on the ground and dragged me to the Ministry. When we got there, they took my mobile phone and threw my camera on the floor, smashing it." Gadwat was surprised and shocked. He kept saying, "I'm a journalist. Journalism… Journalism. Here is my ID... What are you doing?" But the security men wouldn't listen. During last year's 18-day revolution, Hosni Mubarak and his regime unleashed an unprecedented and systematic attack on local and international media. His supporters assaulted reporters in the streets, while security forces began obstructing and detaining journalists covering the unrest that threatened to topple his Government. They even killed some journalists, like Ahmed Mahmoud, who worked for a State-owned publication and died during the demonstrations last year. He was shot in the eye by a police officer while taking photographs of the protests on his mobile phone from the balcony of his office. This ultimately cost him his life. Since his death, journalists have held many protests demanding an investigation into his shooting by security forces. Egypt's Press Syndicate obtained photos of the officer who shot Mahmoud from the deceased's mobile phone, taken a few minutes before his death. "Despite this evidence, the Ministry of the Interior has not yet arrested him," says Abeer Saady, board member of the Journalists' Syndicate. In the recent clashes, in which Gawdat participated, a number of protesters lost their eyes. One of them was Mahmoud el-Ezzawi, an announcer with Egyptian TV who was shot in the eyes by a pellet while covering the events. Another local journalist was wearing protective glasses, which were smashed when a policeman shot him with a pellet. "The snipers were shooting to blind people. When he failed to blind the journalists with the smashed glasses, the policeman shot him 21 times in the legs with pellets. He is still in hospital," Saady told this newspaper. "We have submitted complaints against the Ministry of Interior to the Public Prosecutor. We have also asked every media institution to protect their journalists with protective equipment. If they don't do that, we will prevent the journalists from covering such risky events," she stressed. Saady believes that these complaints have gone with the wind, as the people who killed demonstrators during the revolution are still working. Despite all the evidence, no-one has taken any action against these criminals. "The Public Prosecutor should inspect all the cases since the revolution; if not, he ought to be given the sack,” added Saady. Gadwat, who has bought a new camera to replace the broken one, believes that the revolution will not succeed unless the police are purged of the corrupt officers. "For 30 years under Mubarak, these policemen were trained in repression. When we cleanse this agency, we can have a New Egypt," he said confidently.
