Nathalie, 56 years old, did not expect to discover the two faces of the country during her trip to the land of the Pharaohs.
The dream and the nightmare.
It all started with ten days of ideal vacation in Upper Egypt (Aswan, Abu Simbel, Karnak, Nile cruise…).
But happiness turned into a very painful ordeal of eight days in the jails of a Luxor police station.
On the day of departure, while the suitcases were x-rayed through customs at the city's airport, Nathalie was arrested for possession and trafficking of an antique.
The two experts contacted by customs concluded after some hesitation that it was not a copy;
it is, according to them, 4500 years old.
The day before, this fifty-year-old lawyer bought a statuette in an art gallery at the Winter Palace Hotel.
She negotiated a price of 250 euros with her friend and two other French people who were buying copies of hippos or other animals.
“
I was very attracted by this object, a small character dressed in a loincloth, seated, holding his hands on his knees
,
I had no idea that he would not bring me luck
,” she told us.
Read also: These innocuous objects can land you in prison abroad
Forty inmates in 10 m²
The police suspecting her of trafficking in antiques, the spiral begins.
She is transferred to the city police station.
Her court-appointed lawyer explains to her that she is presumed guilty, and he apologizes to the police.
“
It was very hard to see the extent to which he did not defend my interests
,” summarizes Nathalie, who is gradually gaining an understanding of the local judicial system.
She sits overnight alongside forty people in a 10m2 room.
Jean-François Rial, CEO of Voyageurs du Monde, its operator, knows the country very well.
He gets her a cell alone where, at least, she can read.
“
In thirty years of presence in Egypt, we have never had to deal with this type of case
,
we have a very good network, and this helped us to improve the conditions of Nathalie's detention in the following days, but it was very difficult to speed up the procedures, because state security, which had taken charge of the file
,” he told us.
It is surprising that a traveler should be so mistreated, on such a fragile basis, when tourism remains one of the country's last economic resources.
The list is long of Egypt's plagues at the moment: shortage of wheat due to the war in Ukraine, humanitarian challenge due to the tragedy in Gaza, reduction in the passage of carriers through the Suez Canal due to attacks by Houthi rebels in the Red Sea, and decline in tourist numbers.
“State security is indifferent to these kinds of economic considerations, it does what it wants, and even Abdel Fattah al-Sissi (the Egyptian president, editor’s note) does not have control over them
,” deciphers Jean- François Rial.
Intervention by the ambassador
However, for a long time, the Egyptian authorities have been keen on antiquities trafficking networks.
“
They take this subject very seriously
,” he says.
Two days later, Nathalie appeared before a French-speaking judge, in a less tense atmosphere.
To demonstrate that the statuette is a copy, the gallery owner gave the address of the manufacturing workshop where we can see the same models lined up.
The judge recognizes the good faith of the defendant.
He declares the proceedings stopped.
But she does not have access to the judgment, and she will not know if it is a case of a formal dismissal.
Her hope of being quickly released comes up against state security, who does not see it that way.
It will take the intervention of the brand new French ambassador in Cairo, Éric Chevallier, who called the security boss directly.
She is finally put on a plane to Paris.
“
From what I understand, I am banned from entering the country for life
,” notes Nathalie.
The lawyer does not intend to stop there.
She would like to take action so that the Egyptian state lifts the ban and recognizes the dismissal of the case.
Perhaps she could reclaim the confiscated statuette herself?
It's not win.
“
Outside the countries of the European Union, this story can happen anywhere, including the United States or Japan,
” observes Rial.
When it comes to Egypt, the message is clear: it's better not to buy anything.
In video -
A year ago, Egypt revealed the discovery of a tunnel inside the Great Pyramid of Giza