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AMEWS

Letter to support Egyptian writer Nawal Elsaadawi and her husband Serif Hetata. Their marriage was to be annulled by conservative clerics because of Elsaadawi's feminist writings. Over 4700 signatures were collected and the case was dropped.

May 25, 2001

General Prosecutor
Maher Abdel Wahab
Minister of Justice
Counselor Farouk Seif El Nasr
Ministry of Justice, Lazoughly Square,
Cairo, Arab Republic of Egypt

Your Excellencies:

We, the undersigned, are writing to protest the attempt to annul the marriage of Nawal Elsaadawi and Sherif Hetata on the grounds that the views expressed by Dr. Nawal Elsaadawi, medical doctor, writer and active defender of the rights of women place her outside the boundaries of Islam.
We are deeply concerned that such a measure can only produce an extremely negative image of Egypt and the Arab and Islamic world. This intended legal action against Dr. Elsaadawi and her husband, Sherif Hetata will be considered to be a basic infringement of human rights, and political and religious freedoms.
We ask you to do all that is within your power to be certain that justice and intellectual freedom prevail in Egypt.

Sincerely,

Dr. Sherifa Zuhur
President, Association for
Middle East Women's Studies
& Visiting Research Scholar
Center for Middle Eastern Studies
University of California, Berkeley
(510) 845-2803
szuhur@earthlink.net

P.S. Approximately 4,201 individuals are represented in this letter. 507 different individual or group signatures were previously collected bringing the total supporting this letter to over 4,708. The first set of 8 signatures was included on the first letter. All others are new.
P.P.S. We are aware that one charge against Dr. Elsaadawi was withdrawn on May 23 and applaud this decision, but that for some reason she is still scheduled to appear in court on June 18 for the hisba-annulment proceedings.