Abu Aardvark: Speaking of Egypt

Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice is due to visit Cairo tomorrow. Many Egyptians will be watching to see whether she manages to spend her day there without making a public statement in defense of Ibrahim Eissa and the other Egyptian journalists facing prosecution - or, more accurately, political persecution - over the "crime" of spreading rumours.

Nobody really expects much from the United States anymore, to be frank. It seems like a long, long time ago that Condoleeza Rice came to the American University of Cairo to deliver a stirring speech apologizing for past American support for Arab dictatorships and pledging American support for democracy and reform. Rice has repeatedly managed to go to Egypt during particularly repressive moments without saying a thing. To this day, Egyptians of all political stripes marvel at the fact that America has failed to even get Ayman Nour out of prison - how is it possible, they ask, that America can't even protect its friends? Egyptians are divided over what is more relevant: American hypocrisy (talking democracy but doing nothing about it) or American impotence (failing to move Mubarak even when it does "try").

Look, nobody really expected America to be able to convince Hosni Mubarak to let himself be voted out of office, even if that had been something the US wanted. And nobody really expects the Bush administration to speak out on behalf of imprisoned Muslim Brotherhood leaders, even if they are tried in blatantly undemocratic military courts, their property seized without a pretence of due process, or their human rights violated in the notorious Egyptian security prisons. But is it too much to ask that the Bush administration speak out forcefully, and act effectively, in support of such a small but existentially important thing as the freedom of the press?

Ibrahim Eissa and his fellow defendents represent the heart of what remains of Egypt's political opening, a brash and courageous independent press without which any serious reform is impossible. Rice should say something about this, even if it annoys Mubarak's regime... and if she doesn't, it will be noticed.