Egypt arrests seven trans people for ‘debauchery’ using fake dating profiles

Seven trans people have been arrested after being accused of debauchery, after police used fake dating profiles to lure them to a nightclub.

The Independent News Service reports that the people were accused of being “perverts”, and that they had been told they were arrested for forming “a network for practicing debauchery” on social media.

The head of Egypt’s ‘morality police’ reportedly said the arrested had been monitories by the government and that fake web pages had been created to entrap them.

He said the seven were lured into a nightclub in Cairo, where they were arrested.

Men accused of homosexuality are often accused by Egyptian authorities of “debauchery”, because the country does not have a specific anti-gay law. This new “sting” represents a targeting of the trans community.

A journalist who led a “sting” on 26 men she accused of “perversions” for attending what she said was a gay bath house in Cairo now faces court herself charged with defamation.

The men arrested were accused of “perversions” as journalist Mona Iraqi told police that the bathhouses were used for “group perversions”. One reporter posted pictures of the dozens of men, mainly naked, being rounded up during the raid and put into vans.

The bathhouse owner was accused by prosecutors of facilitating the “practice, facilitate and incite debauchery.”

All 26 men were later acquitted.

• TV
• May 11

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