2 Officials Charged in Book Publication

Egyptian prosecutors have charged two officials from the Culture Ministry for their role in publishing an allegedly blasphemous book that triggered riots by Muslim students, a police official said in Cairo. Ibrahim Aslan, the ministry official in charge of publications, and Hamdi Galeel, the managing editor of the publications department, were charged with disparaging religion and editing and publishing a work offensive to public morals, the police official said. The charges came a day after it was disclosed that a committee of literary experts appointed by Culture Minister Farouk Hosni ruled that the book--the 1983 novel “A Banquet for Seaweed” by Haidar Haidar--was not blasphemous and said critics had quoted from it out of context. About 5,000 students opposed to the book clashed with police Sunday and Monday at Cairo’s Al Azhar University. Police released 75 students who had been arrested.