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Egypt jails 262 pro-democracy protesters

January 9, 2018 at 4:40 pm

An Egyptian court jailed 262 people to between three years to life today for security-related offences during pro-democracy sit-ins in 2013, judicial sources said.

They were charged with causing the deaths of two policemen during clashes at Al-Nahda square in Giza in southern Cairo, as well as other counts of attempted murder and vandalism.

Seventeen people were sentenced to life in prison, 223 were given 15 years and another 22 were given three years.

The court acquitted 115 others.

Read: Egypt MPs call on Sisi to release innocent jailed minors

The court also ordered that those sentenced be fined a total of nearly 40 million Egyptian pounds ($2.27 million) for damaging public property.

Al-Nahda square was one of two sites where pro-democracy protesters and supporters of the country’s first democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi gathered in the weeks following his overthrow in a military coup in July 2013 led by then general and now President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi.

Authorities broke up the sit-ins at Al-Nahda and Rabaa squares in August 2013, killing hundreds of protesters. Protests were banned shortly after sit-ins were dispersed and thousands were arrested.

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Egypt has since outlawed the Muslim Brotherhood group, from whom Morsi hails.

Security forces have killed hundreds and detained thousands of members of the group, which says it is committed to political change through peaceful means only.