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“The Egyptian government knew their own secret service was making a huge mistake”

June 27, 2014

Dutch journalist Rena Netjes sounds furious over the phone. She didn’t get much sleep last night. “There are so many lies being spread, including by the Egyptian ambassador in the Netherlands,” says Rena. “I did have permission to do my job in Egypt. Until December 31, 2013, I was working with a permanent press card. Since January 14, I had a temporary one.” Last Monday, she was one of the convicted Al Jazeera English journalists that received a ten year prison sentence in absentia for ‘working, financing and falsifying footage for Al Jazeera in order to defame the Egyptian state’. However, Netjes has never worked for Al Jazeera English, as the organization has confirmed and the proof against her is non-existent. “The fact that the Egyptian court failed to even get my name and passport number right represents [how] the entire trial [proceeded]. A non-existing Dutch name, ‘Johanna Indienetta,’ with a non-existing passport number is convicted of being a terrorist. The Egyptians never made a connection to me, Rena Netjes. All they knew is that this person was a member of a terrorist network,” explains Rena. “I cannot travel to…


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