Egypt orders closure of leading independent news site Mada Masr

An Egyptian court has ordered the closure of Mada Masr, one of the country’s last prominent independent news outlets, and fined its editor-in-chief, Lina Attalah, three million Egyptian pounds ($53,400) for running a website without a licence.

The New Cairo Misdemeanour Court also ordered the confiscation of the outlet’s equipment and devices. Attalah was taken into custody after Tuesday’s ruling. She was released several hours later, after Mada Masr paid the fine in full.

During the release procedures, Attalah learned that she had been sentenced in absentia in 2024 to one year in prison, on charges of publishing false news and running an unlicensed website. Mada Masr said Attalah’s lawyers have challenged that ruling, and a retrial hearing is scheduled for November 11.

In an editorial published hours after the verdict, Mada Masr said it had entered court “with a measure of faith in the law and the justice system”. It added: “But what we found in court left none of that faith intact.”

The outlet said the court refused its lawyers’ requests to review the case file, submit additional evidence and call witnesses. According to Mada Masr, the judge then appointed “an unknown party” to act as Attalah’s defence lawyer, even though eight of her own lawyers were in court and she herself objected. The editorial said the judge wrote that lawyer’s requests himself “before issuing a verdict carrying the maximum penalty, with no review and no defence”.

Hossam Bahgat, head of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, attended the hearing. According to Mada Masr, he said the court went ahead with the appointment despite Attalah’s own objection to being represented by a court-appointed lawyer. Mada Masr’s lawyer, Hassan al-Azhari, told the Egyptian outlet Zawia3 that the court rejected the defence’s requests and then appointed a lawyer, a step Attalah and her team objected to.

Egypt’s website laws

Tuesday’s ruling is based on Article 105 of Egypt’s 2018 media law, which sets fines of one to three million Egyptian pounds ($17,800–$53,400), plus closure and confiscation, for operating an unlicensed website.

Mada Masr says it applied for a licence from the Supreme Council for Media Regulation in 2018 and again in 2020, without a reply. It says it learned of a rejection only when prosecutors raised it during a previous case in 2022. In 2023, an administrative court upheld the council’s refusal, citing the absence of proof that the outlet’s trademark was registered, although Mada Masr’s lawyer said he had submitted a trademark registration certificate. A new application has been pending since June 2023.

There was no immediate official comment on the verdict.

The head of the Journalists’ Syndicate, Khaled el-Balshy, said the union would take legal action to appeal the ruling.

Mada Masr was founded in 2013 and has been blocked inside Egypt since 2017. It says it has faced six cases in six years, and rights groups say this is the first to reach trial.

“We tried to defend the law,” the outlet wrote, “just as we tried to defend ourselves.”

Amnesty International’s senior director for regional impact, Yasmine Ahmed, said in a statement, “Today’s decision represents a crushing blow to press freedom in Egypt and marks a dark day for independent journalism in the country.”

“This draconian ruling is the culmination of years of relentless harassment and unjust proceedings designed to shut down one of the country’s last remaining independent media voices,” Ahmed added.

The verdict came on the same day that Egypt’s Supreme State Security Prosecution, which investigates national security cases, renewed the detention of six journalists from the fact-checking platform Matsadaash for another 15 days.