Prosecutors in Egypt have charged six journalists working for the independent fact-checking platform Matsda2sh with belonging to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, according to their lawyer.

🌐 Here's What Happened

Nabeh al-Ganadi said on Monday that the men were accused of joining a terrorist group, funding terrorism, publishing "fake news", and using social media to call for acts of terrorism, he added. Matsda2sh has denied the allegations.

Later, Ganadi said the State Security Prosecution had remanded five of them in custody for 15 days, and that the sixth was still being interrogated.

The journalists' arrests last week were condemned by international human rights and press freedom organisations.

📌 Key Details

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) called the detention of Matsda2sh's entire newsroom a "grave escalation in Egypt's campaign against independent journalism".

It said the country remained one of the world's leading jailers of journalists, with 25 currently imprisoned or detained.

President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi has overseen what human rights groups say is an unprecedented crackdown on dissent since he led the military's overthrow of his predecessor, Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Morsi, in 2013.

Tens of thousands of people have been detained, mainly Muslim Brotherhood officials and supporters but also leading secular and liberal activists, media workers and academics.

Matsda2sh, whose name means "Do Not Believe" in Arabic, was founded in 2018 to "resist the flow of false or misleading news", according to its website.

It regularly fact-checks statements made by Egyptian officials and carries out investigative reporting in Egypt and other Arab countries.

📰 Source: BBC Africa