Powder keg Sinai: 48 people taken hostage by Bedouins since the end of January

Since the beginning of the year, Bedouins have taken 48 hostages in Egypt. The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) sees this as a clear sign for a growing unrest on the Sinai Peninsula. "The number of tourists, foreign workers, peacekeepers and Egyptian soldiers who have been kidnapped by Bedouins has increased significantly since the end of January 2012," stated the STP's expert on questions regarding Africa, Ulrich Delius, in Göttingen on Tuesday. "Fortunately, the kidnappers usually set their victims free after a few hours – without charging ransom money and without anybody being seriously injured. Even so, a commitment for peace and development of the country must have top priority for the future Egyptian government. If one is trying to advocate for security on the peninsula, the 500,000 Bedouins should no longer be discredited as suspected terrorists but must be treated as citizens with equal rights."

On Monday, ten kidnapped UN peacekeeper-soldiers from the Fiji islands had been set free. Previously, 25 Chinese workers had been kidnapped at the end of January. Three South Korean tourists and two American travelers were taken hostage in February, two Brazilian tourists in March and six Egyptian soldiers were kidnapped on May 5, 2012. According to the STP, the Bedouins are mainly taking hostages to draw attention to their plight and to try and have their imprisoned relatives released. Bedouins are often delinquent because poverty forces them to work as smugglers or as helpers for radical Islamists.

Some Egyptian presidential candidates see the Sinai merely as a security problem, others want to finally boost the economy there. For example, the candidate of the Muslim Brotherhood promised to establish industrial and agricultural projects and a railway line – with a total value of three billion US-dollars. "Most of the Bedouins don't believe in promises like this because too many agreements were not met in the past," said Delius. "The promotion of the economy is important to improve the living conditions of the impoverished indigenous people." But the Bedouins also want rights. It is not enough that they only have one representative in parliament and that they are still not treated as citizens with equal rights even now, 30 years after the Israeli army left the country.