Dailynewsegypt

Tag: Missing

  • UPDATE: Military aircraft sent to look for 5 missing citizens in Aswan

    Defence Minister Sedki Sobhi commissioned on Monday afternoon a military aircraft to search for five citizens who are missing in Aswan Governorate.

    Armed forces spokesman Colonel Ahmed Ali said on his official Facebook page that the defence minister’s decision comes as a “quick response” to the news of the missing citizens.

    The citizens reportedly went missing in a mountainous area in the vicinity of the Cajoug village in Kom Ombo, Aswan. State run Al-Ahram reported that they had been headed to a mine in the village, however a military source said those missing had been reported missing during a safari trip.

    The military source stated that the wife of one of those missing had received a phone call from her husband on Monday morning telling her that they are missing in the mountainous Gebaila area and one of them is dead. The wife reported the incident to the Aswan Crisis Centre which in turn notified the armed forces.

    Upon investigating the matter, the military source said the armed forces had not been notified of a planned safari trip in the Gebaila area. The source added that any travel agency preparing a safari is obliged to notify the armed forces of the planned trip. He also stated that people usually head to the Gebaila area in search of gold.

    In February, eight hikers became lost in Saint Catherine, Sinai, during a blizzard that kept them trapped in the isolated Bab El-Donya Mountain. Four hikers died before the group was rescued; the remaining four were found in poor health conditions.

    Following the incident, the armed forces were accused of negligence toward stranded hikers’. Before the fourth hiker was found dead, Ali issued a statement saying that a military search for the missing hiker was underway. Former Defence Minister Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi had ordered army search and rescue aircraft as well as pedestrian patrols to comb the area.

    The body of the final hiker, Mohamed Ramadan, was found five days after the group went missing.

    On 22 February, South Sinai Governor Khalid Fouda sacked the head of Saint Catherine city, citing negligence toward the lost hikers.

  • Military aircraft sent to look for 5 missing citizens in Aswan

    Military aircraft sent to look for 5 missing citizens in Aswan

    Defence Minister Sedki Sobhi (Photo courtesy of Army spokesman)
    Defence Minister Sedki Sobhi
    (Photo courtesy of Army spokesman)

    Defence Minister Sedki Sobhi commissioned on Monday afternoon a military aircraft to search for five citizens who are missing in Aswan Governorate.

    Armed forces spokesman Colonel Ahmed Ali said on his official Facebook page that the defence minister’s decision comes as a “quick response” to the news of the missing citizens.

    The citizens reportedly went missing in a mountainous area in the vicinity of the Cajoug village in Kom Ombo, Aswan. State run Al-Ahram reported that they had been headed to a mine in the village, however a military source said those missing had been reported missing during a safari trip.

    In February, eight hikers became lost in Saint Catherine, Sinai, during a blizzard. Four hikers died before the group was rescued.

  • Two Spanish journalists freed in Syria: colleagues

    Two Spanish journalists freed in Syria: colleagues

    A handout picture obtained on December 11, 2013 shows Spanish freelance photographer Ricardo Garcia Vilanova (L) and El Mundo daily newspaper correspondent Javier Espinosa during the XI Miguel Gil Moreno Journalism Award held at the Bertelsmann headquarters in Barcelona on May 24, 2012. The two journalists taken hostage by an Al-Qaeda-linked group last year have been freed, the Spanish daily El Mundo reported on March 30, 2014. AFP PHOTO/ PRH/ JOAN BORRAS == RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO/ PRH/ JOAN BORRAS " - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS ==
    A handout picture obtained on December 11, 2013 shows Spanish freelance photographer Ricardo Garcia Vilanova (L) and El Mundo daily newspaper correspondent Javier Espinosa during the XI Miguel Gil Moreno Journalism Award held at the Bertelsmann headquarters in Barcelona on May 24, 2012. 
    (AFP PHOTO/ PRH/ JOAN BORRAS)

    AFP- Two Spanish journalists taken hostage in Syria by an Al-Qaeda-linked group walked free after six months in captivity and were heading back to Spain on Sunday, their friends and colleagues said.

    El Mundo correspondent Javier Espinosa, 49, and freelance photographer Ricardo Garcia Vilanova, 42, were “freed and handed over to the Turkish military”, the Spanish newspaper said on its website.

    Espinosa called El Mundo’s offices on Saturday evening and said they were in good health, it added.

    “Pure happiness,” wrote Espinosa’s girlfriend, the journalist Monica Garcia Prieto, on Twitter early Sunday, without giving further details.

    “Their relatives are feeling excitement and joy because this puts an end to a nightmare that has lasted six months,” a spokesman for their families, Gervasio Sanchez, told AFP.

    Espinosa and Vilanova were seized on 16 September as they tried to cross the Syrian border to Turkey, the latest of scores of journalists captured while covering Syria’s civil war.

    There was no immediate word on Sunday on whether any demands were made by their kidnappers or any ransom paid.

    The Spanish Defence Ministry told AFP a military aeroplane bringing the two journalists back from Turkey was scheduled to land in Madrid about 4.00 pm (1400 GMT).

    El Mundo identified the captors as members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, a jihadist faction in Syria with roots in Al-Qaeda’s Iraqi affiliate.

    The group has fought against the regime of Bashar Al-Assad in Syria but has also been battling other rebel groups.

    The newspaper had kept the kidnapping quiet until December while it contacted the captors via intermediaries. It said at that time that the kidnappers had made no demands.

    “It has been a hard few months. We knew the wait would be long but you never get used to it,” said the director of El Mundo’s international pages, Ana Alonso Montes, on Sunday.

    “You never know when the moment of liberation will come, although we never doubted it would,” she told national radio.

    Award-winning reporter Espinosa has been a Middle East correspondent for El Mundo since 2002 and is based in Beirut.

    Like Vilanova, he has covered some of the most dangerous points in the Syrian conflict, including the siege of Homs in February 2012.

    On 22 February he escaped that bloodbath in which human rights groups said 700 people were killed and thousands injured, and made it back to Lebanon a week later.

    Among those killed in Homs were two other Western journalists: US reporter Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik.

    Espinosa wrote of his escape from the city, under fire among a crowd of wounded refugees, in a compelling reportage published in March 2013.

    “We believe the Syrian people need our work, and that we must live up to our responsibility,” said Prieto, who is also a prize-winning journalist, in December.

    An online forum that frequently features statements from jihadists had also called on the militants to free the two.

    The Honein jihadist forum said the two journalists were a “good hand for advocating our issues in Iraq and Syria, and carrying the silenced truth”.

    Garcia Vilanova has contributed to Agence France-Presse and other world media such as the New York Times and the Washington Post.

    Media rights group Reporters Without Borders ranks Syria as the most dangerous country in the world for journalists.

    A third Spanish journalist seized separately in Syria in September, Marc Marginedas, a correspondent for the Catalan daily El Periodico, was freed early this month.

    French, US and Syrian journalists are among the others still missing in Syria.

  • French woman reported missing in Egypt is found

    AFP – A French woman who went missing during a transit stop in Egypt between flights was found on Tuesday, an official at the French embassy in Cairo said.

    “She was found this morning and was offered the required services of the embassy to help her return to France as soon as possible,” the official said, refusing to say any more.

    A source close to Egyptian investigators said the 25-year-old had been found wandering in a popular neighbourhood of Cairo in a state of “shock”.

    She had arrived from Ghana on Thursday evening and had been due to fly on to Basel-Mulhouse airport in France on Friday, airport officials told AFP earlier.

    On Saturday, the authorities launched a nationwide search for the woman when she failed to catch her connecting flight.

    Asked about her disappearance and whether she had been abused during the four days and nights she was missing, the embassy official said Egyptian police were investigating what happened between the time she checked in at a transit hotel and when she was found.

    As is procedure for transit stays of longer than 12 hours, the immigration police kept her passport on arrival from Ghana and she was escorted by security officials to the nearby four-star Baron Hotel for her overnight stay.

    But on Friday she failed to board the onward flight to France.

    “She apparently left the hotel on her own,” said a source close to the investigation.

    Cairo has had a night-time curfew since the middle of August when the authorities cracked down on Islamist supporters of president Mohamed Morsi who was deposed by the army in July.

  • French woman reported missing in Egypt

    AFP – Egyptian authorities Saturday launched a nationwide search for a French woman reported missing when she failed to catch a connecting flight the day after she arrived in Cairo, officials told AFP.

    The 25-year-old arrived in Cairo from Ghana on Thursday evening and had been due to fly to Basel-Mulhouse airport in France on Friday, airport security officials said.

    “The procedure for transits of longer than 12 hours is that immigration authorities keep the passport and take the passenger to a hotel,” one official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

    Airport security had escorted the woman to the nearby four-star Baron hotel after she landed.

    “She was meant to go and pick up her passport the following day and fly to France,” the official added.

    A French embassy official in Cairo, who also asked not to be identified, confirmed the woman had been reported missing after she failed to make her flight.

    “The embassy and Paris are working on her case, with the constant cooperation of the Egyptian authorities,” the official said.

    An Egyptian security official said a nationwide search had been launched to find her.

    “She is not being held at any security facility in the country and is not in the custody of any authorities. We are now trying to determine the cause of her disappearance, whether it is kidnap or voluntary,” the official said.

  • Libyan air force locates 48 migrants in desert

    The Libyan air force has located 48 more of the missing migrants lost in the desert near to the Egypt-Libya border, according to AFP.

    The Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced earlier this week that at least 72 Egyptians had been reported missing in the desert. The missing migrants were thought to have entered Libya illegally in two separate groups of 12 and 60. It is thought that they were abandoned by smugglers after they crossed the border, according to AFP.

    The 48 located on Friday by the Libyan air force could mean that all 72 are now accounted for. The spokesman for the ministry said that the ministry is still confirming the details with the Libyan authorities. The spokesman added that it is thought that African migrants are among those that have been found.

    Out of the group of 60, two Egyptian citizens were found to have died of thirst on Monday evening along with the cousin of one of the deceased. The ministry announced that nine more people had been located by a group of Libyan hunters on Thursday evening.

    Of the group of 12, three were injured and are receiving treatment following the explosion of a landmine, resulting in the amputation of the right leg of one of the three. The remaining nine in this group were located in the city of Adjabiya.

    The Libyan authorities conducted multiple helicopter searches of a 450km2 area over the last week to locate the migrants, said the ministry.

    Earlier in October dozens of Egyptian drivers were abducted near Ajdabiya, and were later freed following a joint effort by the Libyan and Egyptian authorities. A Libyan militia chief claimed to have abducted the drivers.

    Egyptians have continued to illegally cross into Libya despite warnings from both governments advising them to obtain the correct documentation before travelling.

    In April, a foreign ministry official said over 4,000 Egyptians entered Libya illegally this year. Egyptian fishermen also violate Libya’s waters for fishing purposes, due to the shortage of fish in Egyptian waters. In March, over 250 Egyptians were deported by Libyan authorities in a crackdown on illegal migrants.

    Also in April, Egypt and Libya signed a military cooperation agreement, which included steps to tackle border security issues.

  • Search continues for Egyptians missing in Libya

    The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has published new information regarding the Egyptians thought to be lost in the Libyan desert. The ministry believes that at least 72 Egyptians entered Libya illegally in two separate groups.

    The ministry announced that the two men who were found dead on Monday evening by the Libyan authorities are Badr Fazza Attia Hassan and Mohamed Mostafa Saeed Mohamed. The authorities confirmed that the pair died of thirst. Hassan’s cousin Bashar Abdel Samie Attia Hassan was found alive and was able to identify the bodies.

    A group of Libyan hunters found nine Egyptians in the desert on Wednesday, according to the ministry, and are now being held in an illegal immigration centre in Libya. They are said to be part of a group of 60 people, which included Hassan and the two deceased, from the governorates of Minya, Alexandria and Kafr Al-Sheikh, having paid money to cross the border through a barbed wire fence at the Musaid-El Salloum and crossing on 16 October, according to the ministry.

    Twelve other Egyptians are also thought to have entered the country illegally, three of which have been transferred to a hospital in Tobruk, a Libyan town 138km from the Egypt-Libya border. One of the injuries is believed to have been caused by a landmine explosion, resulting in the amputation of the victim’s right leg. The nine remaining members of this group are in the city of Ajdabiya.

    The ministry’s statement highlighted that the Libyan authorities have been conducting helicopter searches over a 450 sq km area including water sourcesand areas known to local shepherds. Contact has also been made with the local people living in the countryside areas as well as the nomadic people of the desert.

    The ministry stressed that it is “following developments around the clock in coordination with the relevant Egyptian and Libyan authorities.”

    Earlier in October dozens of Egyptian drivers were abducted near Ajdabiya, and were later freed following a joint effort by the Libyan and Egyptian authorities. A Libyan militia chief claimed to have abducted the drivers.

    Egyptians have continued to illegally cross into Libya despite warnings from both governments advising them to obtain the correct documentation before travelling.

    In April, a foreign ministry official said over 4,000 Egyptians entered Libya illegally this year. Egyptian fishermen also violate Libya’s waters for fishing purposes, due to the shortage of fish in Egyptian waters. In March, over 250 Egyptians were deported by Libyan authorities in a crackdown on illegal migrants.

    Also in April, Egypt and Libya signed a military cooperation agreement, which included steps to tackle border security issues.

  • 100 Egyptians rumoured to be missing in Libya

    One hundred Egyptian citizens are thought to have gone missing near the Libyan border, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Tuesday.

    Official ministry spokesman Badr Abdelatty said in a statement that the Egyptian consulate in Benghazi had made contact with Libyan officials and tribal elders “to verify reports that indicate that 100 Egyptian citizens were rumoured to have entered Libyan territory illegally, have gone missing south of the Tobruk-Ajdabiya road.”

    The Egyptian consulate in Benghazi was not available for comment on the issue.

    Earlier in October dozens of Egyptian drivers were abducted near the eastern city of Ajdabiya, and were later freed following a joint effort by the Libyan and Egyptian authorities. A Libyan militia chief claimed to have abducted the drivers.

    The Egyptian consulate in Beghazi was not available for comment.

    Egyptians have continued to illegally cross into Libya despite warnings from both governments advising them to obtain the correct documentation before travelling.

    In April, a foreign ministry official said over 4,000 Egyptians entered Libya illegally this year. Egyptian fishermen also violate Libya’s waters for fishing purposes, due to the shortage of fish in Egypt’s water. In March, over 250 Egyptians were deported by Libyan authorities in a crackdown on illegal migrants.

    Also in April, Egypt and Libya signed a military cooperation agreement, which included steps to tackle border security issues.

  • Over a thousand still ‘missing’ since 2011 uprising

    Over a thousand still ‘missing’ since 2011 uprising

    Movements such as the No Military Trials for Civilians (NMTC) are also focusing on civilian abduction (file photo: AFP)
    Movements such as the No Military Trials for Civilians (NMTC) are also focusing on civilian abduction (file photo: AFP)

    With more than a thousand still missing after Egypt’s uprising, a new group is searching for answers to abductions and kidnappings. “We Will Find Them” is focusing on finding the civilians missing since the onset of the 2011 uprising. The group held its first press conference describing their mission at the Press Syndicate on 4 August.

    According to the movement, founded in February 2012, some individuals were abducted and released within hours while others remain abducted for months. The movement attempts to motivate the public in order to pressure what it describes as the “official authorities who are responsible for the abductions.”

    Nermeen Yousry, one of the co-founders of the “We Will Find Them” movement, said that the focus of the movement is not only people who have went missing during the revolution but also includes people whose disappearance was related to the security forces and anyone randomly arrested.

    “As people working from within the campaign, we can’t produce an accurate figure on the number of people who have gone missing,” she explained. “The number we have is from 2011 and was produced by Essam Sharaf’s Cabinet. It was 1200, but includes those who died and those who were tried by the military. We don’t know if the numbers have risen or fallen and there is no interest in the issue.”

    “We Will Find Them” may be the first to focus on those missing but other movements such as the No Military Trials for Civilians (NMTC) are also focusing on civilian abduction.

    Amal Bakry of the NMTC explained that the number of abductions might have risen now in an attempt to “terrorize activists.”
    “[The number] goes through ups and downs. The number of abductions was very high during the events of Cabinet protests,” she said.
    Bakry explained that abductors use intimidation tactics to frighten activists.

    “You don’t know who has arrested you and so you don’t know how pursue them,” she explained. “This is to scare activists and make them think a thousand times before they choose to join a march.”

    Two people with connections to the NMTC movement were abducted last month: Anas al-Assal, a paramedic who once spoke at an NMTC conference and Ahmed Ibrahim Saeed, an activist with the movement. Assal and Saeed were kidnapped on the same day.

    Bakry does not believe that the activists are picked up randomly.

    “They are abducted for their connections to something specific, whether it’s an event that happened or a group or movement that they were involved with,” she said.

    According to NMTC, those who get abducted are almost always subjected to physical and psychological abuse and are interrogated for hours if not days before they are released.

    Bakry said that an accurate number of all of those who were abducted is very difficult to obtain because people who are abducted may not report it.

    Three activists working with the NMTC have been abducted within the last year, said Bakry.

    NMTC will hold a press conference on 6 August in order to bring attention to the abductions of activists, which according to a statement released by the movement, are increasing in number. The conference will be held at the Press Syndicate and entitled “Abduction: the Thuggery of the State.”