A Constitution Party member who was kidnapped was found in a hospital on the Cairo-Alexandra Desert Road 14 days after he and a fellow party member were captured, said Mohamed Abdo, a protester participating in the presidential palace sit-in.

The two activists — Mohamed Hamdy Ezz al-Arab, the protester who was found, and Ahmed Ibrahim al-Seht — were reportedly kidnapped on 18 December during the sit-in organized by liberal and secular powers at the presidential palace in Heliopolis. They were protesting violations during the first stage of the constitutional referendum. 

Sit-in participants had told Al-Masry Al-Youm that masked men forced them to get in a pickup truck and took them to an unknown location.

Ezz al-Arab’s relatives said he was tortured and cannot speak, and that he was found lying on the road with signs that he was hit on the head with a stick.

Meanwhile, the area around the presidential palace returned to normal Monday, after the Republican Guard and the army removed all barriers and concrete walls that had been built around it.

But dozens of protesters continue to stage a sit-in, demonstrating for the 25th consecutive day, outside the nearby Heliopolis Club.

Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm