CAIRO: Amnesty International urged Egypt’s interim rulers Wednesday to lift emergency laws that it said had let security officials ride roughshod over human rights for 30 years under former President Hosni Mubarak.
The human rights group said arbitrary arrest and torture had been the “hallmarks” of Mubarak’s rule, and called for a thorough investigation of abuse at the hands of security officials and an end to their impunity.

“It is crucial, as the Egyptian government and Parliament have an historic opportunity to formulate new laws, that the grave deficiencies that have marked the use of emergency legislation in Egypt should not be perpetuated,” Amnesty said in a report.
The group said it welcomed the scrapping of Egypt’s state security apparatus in March but action must be taken to prevent rights abuses in the future.

“Amnesty is not aware of any steps taken to set up an oversight body which will be able to hold the security forces to account for abuses, including human rights violations,” it said. In the report, “Time for Justice: Egypt’s corrosive system of detention”, Amnesty catalogued the brutal treatment of those behind bars – beatings, electric shocks and suspension by the wrists and ankles for long periods, sleep deprivation and death threats.