2008 Cairo landslide

The 2008 Cairo landslide happened on September 6, 2008 at el-Deweika, an informal settlement in the Manshiyat Naser neighborhood of east Cairo, Egypt; 119 people died in the rockslide. Some people blamed for the landslide were arrested and held accountable.[1]

Boulders weighing as much as 70 tons rolled into the shanty town following the landslide.[2] After most of the neighborhood had been flattened, those families still living in the slum were evicted and any remaining buildings were flattened by the government.[2] As a result, hundreds of families were left homeless and many still live in squalor near the site of the disaster, despite government promises to find them homes.[3]

The cause of the landslide has not been definitively determined, but theories included leaked sewage from development projects that eroded rocks.[4][5] An internal investigation determined that the slide was caused by "fate" and no one would be blamed for it.[6]

Amnesty International reports that thousands of Egyptians still continue to live in unsafe slums.[3]

According to Amnesty International, authorities failed to evacuate the impoverished residents and provide them with temporary or alternative housing. People living in areas deemed unsafe in Al-Duwayqa and Ezbet Bekhit were forced out in a manner which breached the international standards that states must observe while carrying out evictions.[7]

In May 2010, a court found Mahmoud Yassin, a Cairo deputy governor, guilty of negligence and sentenced him for five years of imprisonment. Seven other officials were sentenced to three years each.[1]