Egypt Court Issues 25 Life Sentences against Mursi Supporters: Report
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - An Egyptian criminal court sentenced 25 more alleged supporters of the ousted President Mohamed Mursi to life imprisonment, and 94 others to 10- to 15-year jail terms, media reports said.
The court in the central city of Sohag on Thursday convicted the group on multiple allegations, including murder and arson of a church in 2013 following the brutal police dispersal of pro-Mursi sit-in protests at Nahda and Rabaa squares in the capital, Cairo, local Ahram Online news outlet reported.
According to the report, 67 of the total 119 defendants in the mass trial received 15-year prison terms, while 27 of them were sentenced to 10 years in prison. The convictions may be appealed.
The group of defendants was found guilty on numerous allegations, including setting ablaze the Mar Gerges Church in Egypt’s central province of Sohag.
Fifty-five of those convicted were sentenced in absentia. The Egyptian government has not released any information regarding their current whereabouts.
The group has been convicted of involvement in the murder of 15 individuals as well as attempted murder of three more people after the sit-in protest camps were violently dismantled by security forces following the military coup against the first democratically-elected president of Egypt, Mursi, in July 2013.
The coup was engineered by the then head of the armed forces and current President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who has also initiated a brutal crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood members and supporters, Press TV reported.
More than 1,400 people have been killed in the crackdown.
