A 'no to emergency law' protest (Photo by Mai Shaheen)
A military source on Wednesday confirmed that Egyptian emergency laws will continue functioning until the end of June 2012. The statement made by General Adel El-Moursi, head of the Military Judiciary Authority, to the country's official news agency, MENA, comes as a reaction to reports made by some media earlier on Wednesday that emergency laws should be deactivated immediately.
The reports were based on comments made by prominent law expert, Tarek El-Bishry, who led the commission that drafted the constitutional declaration after the ouster of Mubarak last February, in which Al-Bishry mentioned that an extension of the state of emergency could only be passed after a national referendum.
General El-Moursi stressed that the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces did not declare a state of emergency and that the extension of the state of emergency was passed by a presidential decree in June 2010 for two years that will end in the 30 June 2012.
"The new constitutional declaration announced by the ruling military council last March indicates that all laws and regulations approved before the declaration are both valid and respected."
Moursi explained that SCAF is authorised as the de facto president to make changes to a law already in application and accordingly the ruling military council expanded the function of the law last week.
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