Militarised cities, arrested activists set 'climate' for Egypt's Cop27

The UN environment summit scheduled from November 6 to 18. Sharm el-Sheikh is garrisoned by police and plainclothes agents. All forms of dissent have been suppressed, and at least 67 people have been arrested, including an Indian who had promoted a march. Report denounces "high risk" of food and water shortages in the Middle East. 

Cairo (AsiaNews) - The famous tourist destination of Sharm el-Sheikh "militarised" and security forces engaged in a series of raids that led to the arrest of dozens of environmentalists and pro-rights activists.

Amidst imposing security measures and harsh crackdowns on critical voices, Egypt is preparing to host the UN Climate Change Conference (Cop27) scheduled to take place between the resorts overlooking the Red Sea from 6 to 18 November. 

Mohamed Lotfy, Director of the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms (Ecrf), reports that at least 67 people were arrested in Cairo and other cities in recent days and appeared before the magistrate to respond to the call for protests scheduled for 11 November.

Those detained include an Indian activist (pictured), who had promoted a climate and environmental protest march starting in the Egyptian capital. Behind the authorities' clampdown is also the interest in repressing any form of dissent linked to the anti-government demonstrations sponsored by the actor, entrepreneur and exiled activist Mohamed Ali. 

Among the reasons behind the detention is the accusation of spreading false news on social media, with reference to the protest demonstrations. Local sources also speak of an increase in spot checks by security departments and plainclothes agents confiscating (and checking) mobile phones and social accounts.

When asked about the issue, the Egyptian Ministry of Interior did not want to comment and mouths were sealed even among the organisers of the UN climate conference. 

In Egypt, public protests are banned and dissent punished by force, following the overthrow of Muslim Brotherhood leader and former president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 at the hands of then army commander - and now head of state - Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who ascended to the presidency the following year. The repression swept through the leadership and supporters of the Brotherhood as much as ordinary citizens and activists.

The Egyptian chair of Cop27 said that protests would be allowed in designated areas of Sharm el-Sheikh during the summit, but activists expressed concern about possible repression and rights violations. A fear confirmed by the increasing 'militarisation' of the tourist town overlooking the Red Sea, which now looks more like a war zone with checkpoints, searches and agents everywhere than the world centre of climate discussion. Behind the massive deployment is the fear that the UN event dedicated to the environment could be exploited for internal anti-government or global-scale protests. 

On the environmental front, on the eve of the summit Greenpeace released a report talking about the "other risk" of water and food shortages in the Middle East, due to increasingly frequent heat waves and climate change.

Entitled 'Living on The Edge', the study focuses on Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and highlights - like others in the recent past - that the region is heating up twice as fast as the global average, making its food and water supplies 'extremely vulnerable'.

Finally, in these days on the eve of Cop27, Unicef also released a new project based on the so-called 'Children's Climate Risk Index (CRI)' of the Middle East and North Africa region.

In this regard, Egypt scores highest in terms of the exposure of the youngest children to climate and environmental shocks, with over 5.3 million suffering the effects of heat waves. In addition, at least four countries - Egypt, Djibouti, Yemen and Sudan - are projected to have more than 103 million children and 53.5 million adolescents more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change by 2050. The country of the pharaohs has an 'extremely high' risk index.