Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Badie has been sentenced to life in prison for murder and inciting violence. Egypt’s state-run news agency has said that Mr Badie along with 16 others has been sentenced to life in prison on charges relating to the killing of five people in an attack on a police station in 2013. The attack came two days after bloody clashes in Cairo between security forces and Islamist supporters of Mohamed Morsi, following the army removing him from power. A wave of violence swept over Egypt following the mass protests against Morsi’s rule with hundreds left lead after the clashes in Rabaa al-Adawiya Square. It has been widely reported that Mr Badie and other senior figures of the Muslim Brotherhood were accused of inciting members to attack the police station and kill its officers and soldiers. Charges ranged from murder and inciting violence to stealing weapons and destruction of public and private property. The court sentenced 76 others in absentia to the same punishment. Mohamed Badie has already been sentenced to death and to life in prison in other trials. The case is one of a series of mass trials involving supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood since they were toppled from power in 2013.
Factfile
- The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Ismailia,
- Egypt by Hassan al-Banna in March 1928 as an
- Islamist religious, political, and social movement
- Despite a succession of government crackdowns in
- 1948, 1954, 1965, the organisation remains the
- largest, best-organized, and most disciplined
- political opposition force
- Following the 2011 Egyptian revolution the group
- was legalized, and in April 2011 it launched a civic
- political party called the Freedom and Justice Party
- to contest elections
- 4. In 2012, 2012 the party contested the
- presidential election, and its candidate, Mursi
- became Egypt’s first democratically elected
- president
- 5. One year later, following massive
- demonstrations, Mursi was overthrown by the
- military and arrested
- 6. Starting from 2014, the organization has
- been declared a terrorist group and is once again
- suffering a severe crackdown.
