Egyptian women organize against harrassment

ISTANBUL

Young Egyptian women are organizing themselves against harrassment they often encounter in the streets of Cairo.

Nihal Zaad Zaghloul, 26, a young activist who herself was attacked by a group of men in Tahrir Square last summer, has launched a campaign via Facebook in order to create “anti-harrassment teams” out of men and women who volunteer to fight against sexual harrassment. 

“Sexual harassment in Egypt is very big. 83 percent of Egyptian women are harassed and 62 percent of men admitted that they have harrassed women,” Zaghloul said.

Zaghloul said the reason why they decided to create this movement was because they wanted to continue to fight sexual harassment in an organized way. “We created the movement called "imprint movement" and we started recruiting and training people against harrassment.  Right now there are 10 or more anti-harrassment teams in Cairo,” she said.

According to Zaghloul, the Egyptian goverment does little to prevent sexual harrasment against women.  “Before the revolution the police used to refuse to let a woman file a report against her harasser. But now they take the harasser away after we catch him,” she said.