Free speech in Egypt: What you can't say and why

Al-Jazeera journalist Peter Greste was released from prison in Egypt on Monday.

He spent 400 days behind bars, sharing a tiny prison cell with two of his colleagues, Mohamed Fahmy and Baher Mohamed.

They were arrested for spreading "false news" and "aiding" the Muslim Brotherhood, a political party that used to be in power in Egypt.

The three say the only thing they are guilty of is "doing their jobs".

The laws in Egypt really restrict what people can and can't say.

You can't gather to protest in a public space without prior permission from the police.

Also; forget calling David Cameron or Nick Clegg names, in Egypt you can't criticise the government on Facebook or Twitter at all.

This is in stark contrast to the freedom of speech some people hoped for in 2011 when huge uprisings took place in Egypt.

The revolution demanded a democratic Egypt.

At that time people held their phones aloft and shouted for freedom and the toppling of President Hosni Mubarak, who had headed up a strict regime in the country for more than 30 years.

Mubarak was quickly overthrown, yet freedom of speech, external never came.

Georgia Nash, who works for Article 19, a human rights organization, explained: "Since the revolution Egypt has gone through several periods. First they were ruled by the military.

"Even though they'd had the revolution and were calling for all these types of freedoms, it wasn't particularly free.

"Then they had a relatively free election where Mohammed Morsi, the leader of a party called the Muslim Brotherhood, was elected, but he made lots of changes that were not popular and gave himself sweeping powers.

"These also limited free speech, external."

In July 2013, huge street protests against Morsi prompted the military to step in and depose his government.

"After that, the crackdown [on free speech] was a lot more extreme. Immediately after the army took over, five private television stations were closed.

"A thousand people were killed on one day at one particular protest, people who were supporters of the previous president," says Georgia.

Campaign group Human Rights Watch said the killing of at least 817 people by Egyptian security forces on that day probably amounted to a crime against international law.

"Then the government declared emergency law for three months which meant that they could ignore a lot of protections for free expression that would have been there under the law," says Georgia.

"They lifted it after three months, but immediately introduced a new protest law.

"This made it very difficult to protest and you could get really harsh sentences for being part of a protest or even being near a protest, even if you were a journalist who went to report on the protest.

"Since that law was introduced a lot of people have been arrested, a lot of journalists and free speech has been a lot more difficult since then."

One 15-year-old student was arrested merely for possessing a ruler.

Khaled Mohamed Bakara, external was detained because the ruler he was using at school that had a symbol on it used by supporters of Morsi.

What you post on social media can land you in prison too. Georgia says there's a "red line".

"If you are talking about anything to do with the Muslim Brotherhood then you will be considered a terrorist, whether that's on Facebook or any kind of social media.

"It's a no-go area. There are areas which are freer, but that is not one of them."

With the threat of severe punishment, why do Egyptians continue to demonstrate? Georgia says it "shows the depth of feeling, how strongly people feel about free speech".

"Although the government is trying to say they are popular and have public support, a large section of the population is not represented by them.

"There are a lot of young people who are still willing to go out and protest and take that risk.

"A lot of street kids - they've always had such a terrible relationship with the police and maybe they've got less to lose. As well as the political activists, there are always teenagers."

Like Peter Greste himself, Georgia says that people should remember that it's not just famous journalists who are prosecuted under the laws.

"There are hundreds and hundreds of Egyptian journalists in prison and people are not able to protest and express themselves. It's not just Peter Greste. There are others still there."

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