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Egypt detains senior Brotherhood leader

November 20, 2014 at 2:46 pm

Egyptian security forces detained senior Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Ali Beshr early Thursday, a security source has said.

“Beshr has been detained upon an arrest warrant issued by the prosecution on charges of incitement to violence and joining an outlawed group,” the source in the Menoufiya Security Directorate told Anadolu Agency.

The source linked the arrest warrant to calls by Islamists to stage an “Islamic revolution” on November 28.

A source in the National Alliance for the Defense of Legitimacy, the main support bloc of ousted president Mohamed Morsi, earlier told The Anadolu Agency that Beshr, a former local development minister under Morsi, had been detained from his home in Menoufiya province in the Nile Delta.

Morsi, Egypt’s first freely elected president, was ousted by the military in July of last year following massive opposition protests against his rule.

Ever since Morsi’s overthrow, Egyptian authorities have maintained a harsh crackdown on his supporters, detaining thousands and killing hundreds.

Late last December, Egyptian authorities branded the Muslim Brotherhood, the group from which Morsi hails, as a terrorist group.

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, the biggest Arab financiers of the post-Morsi regime, followed the Egyptian suit.