Cairo: An Egyptian appeals court on Monday rejected the prosecution’s challenge of an earlier verdict clearing 26 local men of practising homosexuality in a public bathhouse in a case that has drawn international attention.
Following a brief hearing, the Cairo Appeals Court upheld the acquittal ruling issued on January 12 by a lower court. None of the acquitted men appeared in the court.
They had been rounded up in a highly publicised police raid on a bathhouse in the central Cairo area of Ramsis. They included 21 suspected gays, the owner of the bathouse and four assistants.
They all pleaded not guilty.
In its explanations for the ruling, the court said that the case lacked hard evidence and the testimony made by the police officer, who led the raid, “defied logic.”
A host of a controversial talk show on an Egyptian TV station, meanwhile, came under local and foreign criticism for bragging about leading police to the bathhouse, calling it a “den of group-sex”. The TV presenter, Mona Al Iraqi, was also seen taking photos of the suspects while police were detaining them in December. Some defendants said they would sue Al Iraqi for alleged slander.
Their trial was the second in Egypt of suspected homosexuals in recent months. In late December, another Egyptian court cut jail terms earlier given to eight local men, charged with inciting debauchery, a term used in conservative Egypt to refer to suspected homosexuality.
The eight had appeared in a video celebrating an alleged same-sex marriage. The footage, which went viral online, shows two of them exchanging kisses and rings on a boat on the Nile as the others cheered for them in what prosecutors said was a gay marriage party.
Rights groups have repeatedly criticised Egyptian authorities for performing anal testing on suspected homosexuals.
There is no explicit ban or punishment for homosexuality in Egyptian law. Suspects are often charged with inciting debauchery and outraging public morals.
