Prominent Egyptian doctor forcibly disappeared, interrogated over Facebook posts about Sisi

A prominent Egyptian physician and a former marketing manager at Pfizer Middle East has been interrogated before a state security prosecutor, more than a week after he had been reportedly subjected to enforced disappearance by the authorities.

Security forces detained Dr Hany Soliman after he had publicly criticised Egyptian president Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi in posts he published on his Facebook page, the Egyptian Network for Human Rights (ENHR) said in a statement released on Wednesday evening.

Soliman is currently detained inside Abu Zaabal prison in the Egyptian capital of Cairo.

No further details were immediately available about the outcome of the interrogation or the charges facing Soliman.

In a 26 March post entitled "the painful truth," Soliman argued, that Sisi can never leave the presidency through transparent elections and become "a former president" or "stand…trial for his [alleged] crimes."    

"Neither will he imagine himself as a refugee living with his family in Saudi Arabia like the case with late ousted Tunisian president Zein al-Abidine Ben Ali," Soliman wrote in the post.

One day earlier, in another post, Soliman questioned how much Sisi and his family members financially have, including a brief commentary about an extravagant diamond necklace Sisi's daughter wore recently at the wedding of the Jordanian king's daughter, triggering a debate on social media.

Sisi's regime has overseen a harsh crackdown against government opponents ever since coming to power in a 2013 military coup.

Egypt's human rights record is regularly condemned by human rights groups who estimate that there are about 60,000 political prisoners in the country, many facing abuse, torture, and neglect.