Egypt court hands Morsi death sentence in blow to Muslim Brotherhood

CAIRO — An Egyptian court sentenced deposed President Mohamed Morsi to death on Tuesday over a mass jail break during the country's 2011 uprising and issued sweeping punishments against the leadership of Egypt's oldest Islamic group.

The general guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohamed Badie, and four other Brotherhood leaders were also handed the death penalty. More than 90 others, including influential cleric Youssef Al Qaradawi, were sentenced to death in absentia.

The Brotherhood described the rulings as "null and void" and called for a popular uprising on Friday.

The sentences were part of a crackdown launched after an army takeover stripped Morsi of power in 2013 following mass protests against his rule. Since his overthrow, Egyptian authorities have waged a crackdown on Islamists in which hundreds have been killed and thousands arrested.

The Islamist Morsi became Egypt's first freely elected president after the downfall of longtime leader Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

Judge Shaaban Al Shami, said the grand mufti, Egypt's top religious authority, had said in his opinion that the death sentence was permissible for the defendants who had been referred to him.

Wearing his blue prison suit, the bespectacled and bearded Morsi listened calmly as Shami read out the verdict in the case relating to the 2011 mass jail break, in which Morsi faced charges of killing, kidnapping and other offences.

Shami had earlier given Morsi a 25-year sentence in a case relating to conspiring with foreign groups.

Morsi appeared unfazed, smiling and waving to lawyers as other defendants chanted: "Down, down with military rule," after the verdicts, which can be appealed, were read out at the court session in the Police Academy.

The rulings mark yet another setback for leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, and increase the chances of its youth taking up arms against the authorities, breaking what the group says is a long tradition of non-violence.

‘Nail in the coffin of democracy’

The court last month convicted Morsi and his fellow defendants of killing and kidnapping policemen, attacking police facilities and breaking out of jail during the 2011 uprising.

Shami said elements of Hamas, Lebanon’s Hizbollah, Sinai-based militants and Brotherhood leaders had all participated in storming the jails. He said they had committed “acts that lead to infringing on the country’s independence and the safety of its lands”.

The death sentence request had drawn criticism from Western governments, including Washington, and human rights groups.

A senior Muslim Brotherhood member condemned the trial.

“This verdict is a nail in the coffin of democracy in Egypt,” Yahya Hamid, a former minister in Morsi’s Cabinet and head of international relations for the Brotherhood, told a news conference in Istanbul.

Western diplomats say Egyptian officials have acknowledged that executing Morsi would risk turning him into a martyr. The Brotherhood, the Middle East’s oldest Islamist group, has survived decades of repression, maintaining popular support through its charities.

The death sentences “signals the Egyptian state as rejecting de-escalation in the crackdown against the Brotherhood,” said H. A. Hellyer of the Brookings Institution in Washington.

Morsi, Badie and 15 others were given 25-year jail sentences — for conspiring with Palestinian group Hamas, which rules Gaza. They included senior Brotherhood figures Essam Al Erian and Saad Al Katatni.

‘Diabolical aims’

The court sentenced Muslim Brotherhood leaders Khairat Al Shater, Mohamed Al Beltagy and Ahmed Abdelaty to death in the same case. A further 13 were sentenced to death in absentia.

In reading his verdict, Shami said that the Brotherhood had a history of “grabbing power with any price” and had “legalised the bloodletting of the sons of this country and conspired and collaborated with foreign entities...to achieve their diabolical aims”.

Badie already has a death sentence against him and Morsi has a 20-year sentence in yet another case.

Morsi has said the court is not legitimate, describing legal proceedings against him as part of a coup led by former army chief Abdel Fattah Al Sisi in 2013. Morsi’s court-appointed defence lawyer said he would appeal the verdict.

Sisi, now president, says the Brotherhood poses a grave threat to national security. The group maintains it is committed to peaceful activism.

Some Egyptians have overlooked the crackdown, which has targeted liberal and secular activists, thankful that Sisi has delivered a measure of stability after years of turmoil.

“I don’t care whether the verdict was fair or not. Morsi deserved it,” said a young man at a café in Cairo’s Abbasiya district.

But others were not as vehement.

“My whole life, I had confidence in the verdicts of the Egyptian judiciary. But what has been happening in the past verdicts makes me suspicious,” said a friend. They declined to be named.

Relations with Washington cooled after Morsi was overthrown but ties with Sisi have steadily improved. Cairo remains one of Washington’s closest allies in the region.

US President Barack Obama lifted a hold on a supply of arms to Cairo in March, authorising deliveries of US weapons valued at over $1.3 billion.

Islamist militant groups stepped up attacks against soldiers and police since Morsi’s fall, killing hundreds.