American Student in Egypt Is Detained on Charges of Inciting Protest

An American student was detained in Egypt over the weekend on charges of inciting people to participate in a controversial anti-army strike. Derek Ludovici, a student at the American University in Cairo, was detained in the industrial town of Mahalla Al Kubra alongside the Australian journalist Austin Mackell and a local translator, Aliya Alwi, reports the Al Akhbar English news site, for which Mr. Mackell was on assignment. The three were there to report on a strike to protest continued military rule but were accused of “inciting protest and vandalism,” according to a Twitter message Ms. Alwi sent at the time of their arrest. The government-owned Al Ahram newspaper reported that they were accused of distributing bribes to residents of Mahalla to encourage them to join the strike. In the past year, Egypt’s ruling military authorities have regularly accused unspecified “foreign hands” of fomenting unrest to cripple the country. According to their lawyers, the three are to be released on Monday.