Military sources have dismissed a report aired on CNN in which a senior military official is quoted as saying the army checked the virginity of female demonstrators after they were arrested in Tahrir Square during the revolution.
In the report, the military official said the "virginity tests" were carried out so that the women could not later claim they were raped by the Egyptian authorities, adding that all of the women checked were not virgins.
The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces had on 28 March vowed to investigate the matter, but so far has not announced the results of any such investigation.
The women who claim they were subjected to the tests were arrested on 9 March as the military police cleared Tahrir Square of demonstrators with the assistance of thugs brandishing weapons. Many of those detained by the military reported being tied up, beaten and electrocuted. Some of them were later given prison sentences after expedited trials in military courts.
The international human rights advocacy group Amnesty International said in a statement today that those members of the military who ordered and conducted the virginity tests should be held accountable. Amnesty initially reported on the virginity tests in March, shortly after they took place.
In response to statements from the anonymous general to CNN that the female protesters were "not like your daughter or mine," the London-based rights watchdog said, “This admission is an utterly perverse justification of a degrading form of abuse.”
"The women were subjected to nothing less than torture,” Amnesty International said in its statement.
Translated from the Arabic Edition
