On Monday, the Egyptian Court of Cassation upheld death sentences against 12 people, including leaders of the “banned” Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, as part of the 2013 Rabaa sit-in case, a judicial official said.
“Today, the Court of Cassation upheld the execution of 12 defendants, including Safwat Hegazy, Muhammad al-Beltagy, Issam al-Arian and Abd al-Rahman al-Bar,” the official told AFP, noting that the call for al-Arian had expired due to his death.
He added that the court decided to commute the sentences of 31 defendants from death to life imprisonment.
In 2018, an Egyptian criminal court sentenced to death 75 supporters of the late President Mohamed Morsi after they were convicted of murder and resisting security forces during the dispersal of their sit-in in Cairo, which resulted in the killing of hundreds of them on August 14, 2013.
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The judicial official indicated that the court upheld the 25-year life imprisonment sentence for 47 defendants in the case, led by the group’s guide, Muhammad Badi.
Morsi’s supporters had organized the sit-ins at Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda Square to protest the army’s overthrow of Morsi on July 3, 2013, led by current President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
Following the dispersal of the Rab’a and al-Nahda sit-ins, the security services launched a massive crackdown on Morsi supporters, especially the leaders and cadres of the Muslim Brotherhood, which the authorities have classified as “terrorist” since December 2013.