On May 30 2007, Mr Amr Tharwat, an employee at the Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies, was arrested by Egyptian State Security at his family's residence in Cairo’s Matereya district.

Mr Tharwat was the major organiser of the recent Shura Election monitoring as well as the Ibn Khaldun public opinion polling that was carried out earlier this year. In addition to Mr Tharwat, the Egyptian authorities arrested four other people staying at the house of Dr Ahmed Sobhy (Adellatif Mohamed Saied, Ahmed Dahmash, Abdelhamed Abdelrahman, Ahmed El Sayed) and confiscated files, books, and computers that were found on the premises.

The arrest led a number of civil society activisits to express concerns to their respective governments. No Peace without Justice tabled a number of questions concerning the topic to the European Council and Commission. These questions and concerns were posed by Hon.
Marco Cappato (ALDE) to the Commission on June 22. The following is the latter’s response, issued by Mrs Ferrero-Waldner on July 20.

the Commission is concerned about the increasing number of reports concerning cases of human rights violations in Egypt. The Commission is aware of the above case and, through
the Commission Delegation in Egypt and together with Member States is following its developments closely. The EU raises individual human rights cases with the Egyptian authorities as appropriate based on verified information on a particular case.
The call for greater political reform and respect of human rights constitutes an intrinsic part of the EU’s partnership with Egypt. The Commission, together with Member States, is therefore using all the means at its disposal to encourage Egyptian authorities to progress in this area.
The EU, based notably on the provisions of Article 2 of the Association Agreement, has consistently raised the importance of respecting human rights in its contacts with the Egyptian authorities at all levels. Moreover, a formal dialogue on human rights and democracy issues is further provided for in the EU-Egypt Action Plan under the European Neighbourhood Policy through the relevant subcommittee. uropean Commission Issues Statement Regarding Arrest of ICDS Employee