Asmaa mahfouz biography of rory anderson

In she was one of five recipients of the " Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought", awarded for contributions to "historic changes in the Arab world ".

Asmaa Mahfouz is an Egyptian activist and one of the founders of the April 6 Youth Movement.

Hosni Mubarak had ruled Egypt since , gaining increasing powers over the years and eliminating individual freedoms under an emergency law allowing the police to detain activists without charge. Corruption increased, and as it did, inequality between the rich and the poor and inadequate social services resulted in widespread discontent.

Those working in the textile industry in El Mahalla El Kubra became increasingly dissatisfied with their working conditions and low salaries, driving them to plan a strike in April Young activists in what became known at the April 6 Youth Movement supported the textile workers, encouraging wider action on Facebook and other social networks.

Like the independent journalists, many of them had been harassed and detained by the police, but they continued to support the strikers. Asmaa Mahfouz was one of those who joined them, learning how to make effective use of networking as a means of organising protests. Mahfouz has been credited with having sparked the protests that began the uprising in January in Cairo.

The video was uploaded to YouTube and, within days, went "viral". Today, one of these four has died. Sitting at home and just following us on the news or on Facebook leads to our humiliation. In an interview with al-Mihwar TV , she recalled that a week before 25 January, she had posted a video on Facebook announcing that she would be going to Tahrir Square to protest.

On January 31, Asmaa Mahfouz, told Egypt's Al-Mihwar TV about her decision to use Facebook to take action in Egypt before the Internet was jammed by the Egyptian Missing: rory anderson.

Mahfouz said that four other young Egyptians joined her and that the internal security services quickly surrounded and moved the group away from the square. Following this, she posted another video announcing her intention to go to the square again on 25 January, a national holiday honouring police who had died in a confrontation with British forces.

In this video, she challenged Egyptians to take to the street, saying,.