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Somaia Halawa, sister of Ibrahim, protests on Grafton St in 2016. Brian Lawless/PA
Hunger Strike
'His spirit is finally broken': MEP claims Ibrahim Halawa is 'being kept alive by glucose injections'
Lynn Boylan says Halawa has been ‘on hunger strikes on and off’ throughout his detention.
IBRAHIM HALAWA IS now in a wheelchair and is being kept alive by glucose injections, according to an MEP who has previously visited him in prison.
Speaking on RTÉ’s The Week in Politics, Lynn Boylan says that Halawa’s “spirit is finally broken” and she is fearful he may not survive until his next scheduled trial date.
“His condition has deteriorated dramatically in the last number of weeks,” she said.
“I know Ibrahim has embarked on hunger strikes on and off over the period of his detention, but I think following the parliamentary delegation in January and then the further postponement of his trial, I think his spirit is finally broken so he’s now embarked on this hunger strike. He’s being kept alive by glucose injections and he’s in a wheelchair.
So we’re very very concerned about Ibrahim’s health and we don’t think that, unless there’s a very direct intervention by the Irish government, we’re very fearful that he won’t make it until the next trial.
After visiting Ibrahim in the Cairo jail in which he has been detained for almost four years without trial, Boylan described the harsh conditions that have led to his ill health.
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In January, an Irish parliamentary delegation travelled to Egypt to meet Halawa and though they secured a pledge by the Egyptian president that he would be released following his trial, no movement on his trial taking place has happened.
His trial was in fact since postponed for the 19th time and Boylan has suggested this psychological blow has had a severe impact on the 21-year-old Dubliner.
Speaking on the same programme, former Irish ambassador to Canada, Jamaica and the Bahamas Ray Bassett said that there’s only so much the Irish government can do to secure his release.
“The first thing to say is that the people who are holding Ibrahim Halawa are the Egyptian government, so the Irish government does not have the ability to release him,” Bassett said.
“So sometimes anger is directed towards the Irish government rather than the people who are actually holding him. The Irish government do not have the ability to get him released.”
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