UK – Daily Mail, May 29, 2025
Britain’s former ambassador to Egypt has warned of a ‘real risk’ facing holidaymakers travelling to the country as he urged the government to review its travel advice amid growing outrage over the continued detention of a British-Egyptian activist.
Alaa Abd-El Fattah, a vocal critic of the Egyptian government, has been detained since September 2019. In 2021 he was sentenced to five years in prison on ‘bogus charges’ of ‘broadcasting false news’.
Authorities refused to release him last September, ignoring the two years already held in pre-trial detention. He was held at the hellhole Tora Maximum Security prison before being moved in 2022 amid backlash against the dire conditions.
John Casson, who was the British ambassador to Egypt between 2014 and 2018, told BBC Radio 4 on Thursday that if a friend or family member suggested a holiday in the country today, he would tell them: ‘You’re taking a real risk.’
‘If you get into any kind of difficulties, if you post the wrong thing on social media even, there is no can guarantee that your rights will be protected, there’s no guarantee of due process and we can’t even be sure that the British embassy will be able to visit you.’
He branded Egypt a ‘vindictive’ police state, accusing the government of ‘torturing’ a British citizen and abusing the rights of the British government to operate.
In a co-signed letter published in The Times today, Mr Casson denounced the charges against ‘democracy writer’ Mr Fattah and called on the government to act and warn others travelling to the country.
The letter argued the Egyptian government has ‘ignored calls’ from the international community for accountability over the alleged abuse endured by Mr Fattah in prison, and stressed that his case is ‘not isolated’.
It said there was a responsibility for the government to ‘make clear’ that a British citizen travelling to ‘the police state in Egypt cannot expect fair process, nor normal support from the British government’.
