Around 70 people have gathered for a protest outside the Department of Foreign Affairs in Dublin urging the Government to demand the release of Ibrahim Halawa from detention in Egypt.
Among the protesters are Ibrahim's sisters Fatima, Somaia and Omaima who were detained for three months in Egypt after being arrested along with their brother in August of 2013.
They told the crowd that members of the family had visited Ibrahim today in prison but could only see him through a wire barrier.
She said her brother shouted to relatives that he was being tortured and beaten.
Somaia called on Taoiseach Enda Kenny to phone the Egyptian Prime Minister Ibrahim Mahlab and demand her brother's release.
The 19-year-old, from Tallaght in Dublin, has been detained since his arrest 18 months ago at a demonstration in Cairo.
His family say the teenager feels he is being treated as a second-class citizen by the Irish Government and has called for more to be done to secure his release.
Mr Halawa faces a mass trial with 493 others tomorrow on charges of murder, attempted murder and participating in an illegal protest.
But Amnesty International, which has investigated the case, says he has no case to answer and has declared him a prisoner of conscience.
Yesterday his sisters held a press conference urging the Government to do more to secure their brother's release.
They point out that all other foreign prisoners from the UK, US, Turkey, Canada and Australia have been released following pressure from their respective governments.
Somaia said Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan has called for a separate and fair trial for Ibrahim Halawa and has also applied for a presidential pardon through the prosecutor's office.
But Fatima Halawa says the pressure must be made directly to the Egyptian government to have any effect.
However a spokesperson for the Department of Foreign Affairs said "an enormous amount of work" had been done in the case.
The spokesperson said that the minister had met with the Egyptian Foreign Minister on several occasions and as recently as earlier this month in Geneva.
The minister had asked his Egyptian counterpart for a review of the case, that Mr Halawa be released and allowed home to resume his studies.
Irish consular officials have also visited Mr Halawa in prison on 30 occasions.
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