More humiliation for Starmer as adviser reveals Alaa Abd el-Fattah case was ‘running joke’
Ex-No 10 official was amazed the Prime Minister called bringing Egyptian radical to the UK a priority
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer welcomed the arrival of the Egyptian activist (Image: Getty)
One of Sir Keir Starmer’s former top advisers has mocked the Prime Minister over the release of Egyptian activist Alaa Abd el-Fattah. Paul Ovenden, who served as Sir Keir Starmer’s director of strategy in No 10, said Mr Abd El-Fattah’s case had been “a running joke” in Whitehall.
Sir Keir said this week that bringing the activist to the UK “has been a top priority for my Government since we came to office”. But Mr Ovenden insisted: “His designation as a ‘high priority’ for the Government came as a surprise to me – doubly so, because until recently I was in a position of influence over the Government’s priorities.” Mr Abd El-Fattah arrived in London on Boxing Day after the British Government successfully negotiated his release from custody in Egypt.
Sir Keir said at the time: “I’m delighted that Alaa Abd El-Fattah is back in the UK.” But it emerged Mr Abd El-Fattah had made a series of comments calling for the killing of police and Zionists, describing British people as dogs and monkeys, and declaring: “I’m a racist, I don’t like white people.” He also urged rioters to burn down Downing Street.
Mr Ovenden, who was also Labour’s director of communications when the party was in opposition, said: “What I knew of his plight during my time in government was largely down to his status as a cause célèbre beloved of Whitehall’s sturdy, clean-shirted diplomats and their scurrying auxiliaries.
“They mentioned him with such regularity that it became a running joke among my colleagues – a totem of the ceaseless sapping of time and energy by people obsessed with fringe issues.”
He said the obsession with Mr Abd El-Fattah in Whitehall showed how the Government was influenced by “the celebrity letter-writing campaign and the activist lawyers”.
Mr Ovenden said: “Once you start noticing it, you see it everywhere – in the democratic powers handed to arm’s-length bodies or the many small government departments too powerless or captured to resist lobbying efforts.”
Mr Abd El-Fattah was granted UK citizenship in December 2021, reportedly through his British-born mother, under former Conservative prime minister Boris Johnson.
His imprisonment for charges of spreading false news was branded a breach of international law by United Nations investigators. He was pardoned by Egyptian president Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi in September after years of lobbying by Conservative and Labour governments.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper has said due diligence arrangements were “completely inadequate” and ordered a review to ensure lessons are learned.
Mr Ovenden quit as Sir Keir’s director of strategy in September 2025
