Most of the detained journalists from the news platform Matsadaash told the Supreme State Security Prosecution yesterday that they had been tortured at National Security Agency facilities in the days following their arrests, before being brought before any judicial authority.

Their accounts were recorded during their questioning before the prosecution on Sunday, according to defense lawyers who attended, according lawyers from the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) and the Journalists Syndicate who were present with the journalists.

The journalists described being bound with their hands behind their backs and blindfolded while being held and interrogated at National Security facilities. They also reported beatings, forced stripping, electric shocks and threats to harm them or their families.

During the prosecution questioning, which lasted more than 10 hours overnight, most of the journalists also stated for the record that the officers who arrested and detained them in different governorates had forced them to record fabricated “confessions.” They said the officers made them read statements on camera from papers they were given, in what appears to be an effort to manufacture evidence that could later be used to convict them.

Defense lawyers had all these accounts entered into the record and asked prosecutors to investigate them as complaints filed by the journalists as victims. They also requested that any “confessions” attributed to the journalists during their secret detention be declared invalid, and that the National Security officers responsible for the detention facilities be summoned and questioned about the reported torture.

Some journalists asked to be referred for forensic examination to document their injuries. Prosecutors ordered at least one of them to undergo a medical examination today.

According to documents reviewed by the defense lawyers, the accusations against the journalists rest on an investigation report by a National Security officer. The report accused them of setting up a social media page “to stir up the Egyptian street and create a revolutionary climate by using technical methods on social media and recruiting people with no political affiliations for their own purposes.”

Prosecutors ordered the journalists to be brought before them again today. Their families and lawyers still do not know where they are being held, as the lawyers were not allowed to meet privately with their clients yesterday.