Egyptian Court Fines Mada Masr Editor Lina Attalah and Orders News Outlet Closed

Egyptian authorities have released Lina Attalah, editor-in-chief of the independent news site Mada Masr, following the payment of a 3 million Egyptian pound ($53,500) fine after a Cairo court convicted her of managing an unlicensed website and ordered the outlet to close. The judicial decision marks a significant escalation against independent journalism in the country, raising fresh alarm among international human rights organisations and press freedom advocates.

Legal Proceedings and In Absentia Sentence

Attalah was briefly taken into custody during a court appearance where her legal team stated she was unexpectedly detained after a judge appointed a defence lawyer for her in the courtroom. According to her attorney, Hassan al-Azhari, the defence team discovered during the process that Attalah had previously been sentenced in absentia in 2024 to one year in prison alongside a 20,000 Egyptian pound fine. The legal team has appealed that sentence, and a retrial hearing has been scheduled for 11 November.

Mada Masr, which was founded by Attalah in 2013, stated that it submitted an application for an operating licence three years ago but never received a response from Egyptian authorities. While the outlet has faced six legal cases over the past six years, press freedom groups noted that this marks the first time a case of this nature against Mada Masr has been referred to trial.

Wider Press Freedom Crackdown

The court's ruling against Attalah and Mada Masr comes shortly after the arrest of all six staff members of Matsadaash, an independent fact-checking platform. The Matsadaash journalists were charged with membership in the banned Muslim Brotherhood. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Egypt remains one of the world's leading jailers of media workers, with 25 journalists currently imprisoned in the country.

Rights organisations, including the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders, the CPJ, and PEN International, strongly condemned the court's actions. Human rights observers highlighted that the intensifyed measures coincide with public statements from Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi alleging conspiracies to destabilise the nation, alongside declarations of his intention to remain in office until 2030 to protect Egypt from subversion.