Cairo Verdicts on Jews Clash with Trial Records, Baldwin Reports

The hanging of two Jews in Cairo on charges of “espionage and sabotage” was motivated by political considerations and bore no relationship to the evidence in the case, Roger Baldwin, chairman of the international League for the Rights of Man, said today at a press conference here.

He virtually accused “high officials” of the Egyptian Government of lying to him when they gave him assurances that extremes penalties” would not be imposed upon any of the 12 Jewish defendants tried by a military court on accusations of “Zionist espionage and sabotage.” Mr. Baldwin had an interview with Egyptian Premier-dictator Col, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and the latter, according to Mr. Baldwin, “expressed moderate views entirely understanding of human rights.”

“All assurances given me when I left a week before the sentences were announced indicated an attitude that would avoid such extreme penalties as would increase tensions or impair the position of Jewish and Arab minorities. In the light of those assurances, the death sentences appeared a shocking reversal. No serious acts of espionage or sabotage were committed. The activities were childish and irrational,” Mr. Baldwin stated.

“The wide range of sentences” imposed – from death to seven years’ imprisonment – “does not square with the trial records, “he continued, He placed the responsibility of the severity of the sentences squarely on Premier Nasser, who approved the sentences before they were publicly announced and who, according to Mr. Baldwin, “may have increased or lessened” the terms imposed upon the prisoners.

HOPES FOR LESS SEVERITY AT FORTHCOMING TRIAL OF MORE JEWS

The chairman of the International League for the Rights of Man expressed the hope that as a result of world reaction to the executions and the severe sentences, the Egyptian Government would be less likely to resort to such severity when seven more Jews come up for trial in March before the same military court that convicted the first batch of Jewish defendants.

Of the seven whose trial will open next month, six are French nationals and one is a Greek citizen. All seven are accused of being in contact with a “foreign political party,” presumably the Communist Party of France.

Mr. Baldwin said that the International League for the Rights of Man, which he represented on his Middle East trip as chairman of the organization, does not intend to bring the case of the Jews being persecuted in Egypt to the United Nations. The League is an accredited organization recognized by the UN.