Egyptian police block solidarity group accompanying aid to Palestinians


AFP
 Date: 12-10-04

AL-ARISH, Egypt (AFP) - Members of an international solidarity group trying accompanying humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip (news - web sites) abandoned their trip after a standoff with security forces, a member of the group said.

"We are returning. Negotiations with the police to go to Rafah have failed," Alima Bouomediene, a French senator from the Green Party, told AFP.

"I am disappointed that Arab states are not in harmony with the Arab street. Israelis can sleep soundly," she said. The Arab world needs more "democracy, freedon and freedom of expression."

The authorities did allow through a convoy of trucks carrying 180 tonnes of aid, including rice, flour, and hundreds of blankets that the group was accompanying.

Egyptian police and border guards had stopped the group of some 300 activists, including 60 Europeans, 150 kilometers (93 miles) from Al-Arish in northern Sinai and prevented them from proceeding to the border town of Rafah.

"We are being blocked by three layers of policemen and border guards. They do not want us to go Al-Arish," a European in the group told AFP, adding that security forces used batons and water cannons against them.

A British woman fainted and a video tape of a cameraman in the group and another tape belonging to a crew from the Arabic Al-Jazeera satellite channel were confiscated, he said.

Six members of the Egyptian Committee for Solidarity with the Palestinians in Al-Arish who were supposed to welcome the convoy were detained briefly and then released, an Egyptian source said.

The convoy of five buses and two microbuses set off from Cairo for Rafah early Friday.

Members of the group said they had processed the necessary documents from the security authorities to deliver the aid and did not understand why they were not being let through.

Source

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