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32 pro-Morsi protesters get 2-year jail terms

03 December 2013 18:56 (UTC +04:00)

The court in Cairo handed two-year jail terms to the defendants on Tuesday for "inciting violence," including assault, thuggery, blocking roads, rioting, and being a member of a "terrorist group" - a reference to the Muslim Brotherhood, which has been spearheading calls for Morsi’s reinstatement.

Egypt has been experiencing unrelenting violence since July 3, when the army deposed Morsi, suspended the constitution and dissolved the parliament. The powerful military also appointed the head of the Supreme Constitutional Court Adly Mahmoud Mansour as the Egypt’s interim president.

The government of Mansour soon launched a bloody crackdown on Morsi supporters and arrested more than 2,000 members of the Muslim Brotherhood including its supreme leader, Mohamed Badie.

The army-backed authorities accuse the activists of inciting violence and attacking security personnel, charges that the Brotherhood strongly rejects as politically motivated.

Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically elected head of state, was also put on trial on November 4 on charges of inciting the killing of protesters outside the presidential palace in 2012.

At the hearing, Morsi reportedly called himself the legitimate president of Egypt and dismissed the trial as “farce.” "This was a military coup. The leaders of the coup should be tried. A coup is treason and a crime," he said.

The trial was adjourned to January 8, and Morsi, who has been detained at a secret location since his removal, was transferred to a prison in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria.