CAIRO — Egypt's Interior Ministry said 950 members of Gamiat Islamiya were
freed from prison over the last few weeks. Gamiat was the leading insurgency
group in Egypt in the 1990s and blamed for the killing of 58 people, mostly
foreigners, in Luxor in 1997.
The ministry said the leader of Gamiat was also released, Middle East Newsline reported. He was
identified as Najeh Ibrahim.
[On April 12, Egyptian security forces guarded the Queen Elizabeth 2
during a stopover in Alexandria. The British government as well as the ship
owner, Cunard, reported a threat against the Queen Elizabeth. They did not
elaborate.]
Over the last few months, President Hosni Mubarak has sought to
reconcile with the Islamic opposition in Egypt, which in 2005 won about 20
percent of the seats in parliament. So far, Mubarak ordered the release of
more than 2,000 Islamists, many of them imprisoned since the assassination
of President Anwar Sadat in 1981.
In a statement on April 11, the ministry said the latest batch of
released detainees included those who spent more than 20 years in prison.
The statement said the prisoners were freed in groups over a 10-day period.
Officials said the biggest release took place on April 11. They said 300
Gamiat members were freed from prison to mark the birth of Islam's prophet
Mohammed.
Egypt has also been releasing members of another major insurgency group,
Jihad. But Islamist sources said far fewer members of Jihad, aligned with Al
Qaida, have been released by the regime. Unlike Jihad, Gamiat declared a
ceasefire in 1999.
Officials said the Mubarak regime would consider an initiative to end 25
years of emergency rule. They said legislation would be introduced in
parliament over the next two weeks that would cancel emergency regulations,
which have imposed severe restrictions on freedom of speech and assembly.
