A 22-year-old Jordanian man has been arrested for uttering "an insult against an Arab head of state". The head of state in question was Hosni Mubarak and the incident occurred outside the Egyptian embassy in Amman during a demonstration protesting against he construction of the border wall between Egypt and Gaza.

The man will reportedly remain in jail for two weeks while investigations into the case are completed.

There seems to be some kind of reciprocal arrangement among Arab countries not to let each other's heads of state be insulted, though as far as I'm aware it's OK to insult non-Arab heads of state as much as you like.

Posted by Brian Whitaker, 19 January 2010.