Patrick Zaki will be released from prison.
This is the decision taken by the judge of Mansura, in Egypt, where the student of the University of Bologna has been incarcerated for almost two years on charges of having divulged false news.
From what is learned, the young Egyptian will be able to leave prison, but at the moment he has not been acquitted.
The news was greeted by the cheers of friends and family. The judge then set the next hearing in February.
During the last audience, Zaki received a visit from an Italian diplomatic representation. "Well, well, thank you", he replied raising his thumb from the "cage" of the accused to the question "How are you?", Then thanking our country for the closeness shown.
Zaki, born in Mansura, is a human rights activist, very critical of the Cairo government and organizer of the electoral campaign of Khaled Ali, a member of the Egyptian opposition. Known for his critical positions towards the Egyptian authorities, accused among other things of not protecting enough the Coptic Christian minority (to which he himself belongs), on 7 February 2020 he returned to Egypt from Bologna, where he was attending a master's degree. As soon as he landed at the Cairo airport he was arrested and for several hours nothing was known about him. The beginning of a long judicial affair, made up of long waits between a hearing, fears of torture and shadows on the work of the judges as well as marked by numerous mobilizations to ask for his release.
“First goal achieved: Patrick Zaki is no longer in prison. Now we continue to work silently, with constancy and commitment. A dutiful thanks to our diplomatic corps ", commented Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio on Facebook.
"The news we have been waiting for so long. Patrick Zaki will be released from prison. We hope to be able to do so soon
to embrace again here in Bologna ", said the mayor of Bologna Matteo Lepore.
(Unioneonline / lf)
