Egyptian deportee held without counsel in Equatorial Guinea after criticizing police

An Egyptian national, Ahmed Soliman, was deported from the United States to Equatorial Guinea and subsequently arrested after he criticized the behavior of security forces in the former capital, Malabo. He has been held for a week at the La Luna gendarmerie station, where he has been denied any contact with his attorneys, according to an anonymous lawyer. Earlier in the month, Soliman posted video of police drawing guns on migrants at a hotel, prompting condemnation from human-rights advocates.

Authorities accused him of breaking a mirror in a hotel elevator, a charge his lawyer says masks retaliation for the video. Amnesty International said Soliman and fellow deportee Samson Birhane were blindfolded and beaten while being taken into custody. Neither the Equatorial Guinea government nor its U.S. embassy has responded to inquiries, while U.S. Representative Adelita Grijalva criticized the third-country deportation practice.