Egypt’s State Council General Assembly on Saturday nominated their own council head despite a recent amendment [JURIST report] reserving that right for President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi . The nomination [Daily News Egypt report] follows a contentious debate over amending the judiciary laws to give the president more control over the judiciary to fight terrorism. The council nominated Judge Yehia Dakroury to be their council head. The new law gives the president the power to nominate the council head which means he may ignore the nomination [Egyptian Independent report].

Egypt’s attempt to provide security through increasingly strict laws has been the focus of recent scrutiny. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein said [JURIST report] last week that Egypt’s recent security measures have been encouraging the very radicalization they were trying to control. In April, JURIST Guest Columnist Mohamed Abdelaal discussed [JURIST report] how the revival of the Emergency Law No. 162 of 1958 had potential to negatively impact the rule of law in Egypt. Also in April an Egyptian criminal court in Cairo sentenced [JURIST report] Habib el-Adly, the former interior minister under former president Hosni Mubarak, to seven years in jail for embezzling more than $100m of public funds.