State security officers who are detained pending investigation into the burning of classified documents said they received orders from their leadership to shred and burn particular documents pertaining to highly ranked state officials, such as former ruling party Secretary General Safwat al-Sherif, former Presidential Chief of Staff Zakaria Azmy, former Prime Minister Atef Ebeid, and former President Hosni Mubarak's secretary Gamal Abdel Aziz.
However, other officers said the destroying documents was a routine and periodic practice, as all data is saved on CDs. They claimed that demonstrators who stormed their offices also burned some documents.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
