CAIRO (AP) – A prominent Al-Jazeera Arabic journalist was detained Saturday in Germany over an Egyptian arrest warrant, the Qatar-based broadcaster reported, the latest in a long series of legal entanglements between Egypt and its satellite news channels.
Ahmed Mansour, a senior journalist with its Arabic service, was detained at 1320 GMT (9 a.m. EDT) while trying to board a Qatar Airways flight at Berlin’s Tegel airport heading to Doha, the station reported. It said he previously had been sentenced in absentia in Egypt to 15 years in prison over allegedly torturing an unnamed lawyer in Tahrir Square in 2011, a charge both he and the channel rejected.
While not identifying Mansour by name, German police spokesman Meik Grauer said authorities detained a 52-year-old Egyptian-British journalist and that prosecutors would look into the arrest warrant Sunday.
In October, Al-Jazeera said Interpol had rejected an Egyptian request to put out a “red notice” for Mansour’s arrest.
The network’s Acting Director General Mostefa Souag called for Manour’s immediate release, in a statement released Saturday evening.