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16 June 2015
Image copyrightEPAImage captionMohammed Morsi has rejected the authority of the courts to try
him
Morsi was overthrown by the military in July 2013 following mass protests a year after he took
office as the country's first democratically elected leader.
protesters during clashes with Brotherhood supporters outside the Ittihadiya presidential palace
in Cairo in December 2012.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionMost of those killed in the clashes outside the
Ittihadiya palace were Brotherhood supporters
Morsi was, however, cleared of inciting Brotherhood supporters to murder two protesters and a
journalist - a charge that could have carried the death penalty.
PRISON BREAKS
In May 2015, Morsi and more than 100 other people was sentenced to death after being
convicted of colluding with foreign militants - from the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas and
Lebanon's Shia Islamist Hezbollah movement - to organise a mass prison break during the
uprising against Hosni Mubarak. Morsi was being held at Wadi Natroun prison in January 2011
when armed men overcame the guards, freeing thousands of inmates. He and his co-defendants,
including senior Brotherhood officials, were also found guilty of the murder and kidnapping of
guards, damaging and setting fire to prison buildings and looting the prison's weapons depot. In
June 2015, a court upheld the death sentence against Morsi and 98 others after consulting
Egypt's grand mufti.
ESPIONAGE
Morsi was also given a life sentence in May 2015 after being convicted of conspiring to commit
terrorist acts with foreign organisations to undermine national security. Sixteen co-defendants,
including three Brotherhood leaders, were sentenced to death after also being found guilty of
leaking state secrets to a foreign state.
Image copyrightAFPImage captionHamas dismissed the claim it plotted with Morsi and the
Brotherhood, calling it a "disgrace"
Prosecutors alleged that the Brotherhood had hatched a plan in 2005 to send "elements" to
military training camps run by Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Revolutionary
Guards in Iran. Upon their return, they joined forces with jihadist groups in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula
and helped create the instability that triggered the 2011 revolution and plagued Egypt
afterwards, they said. The sentences for Morsi and his co-defendants were confirmed by a court
in June.
Endangering national security by leaking state secrets and sensitive documents to Qatar,
which supported him as president, and the Doha-based Al Jazeera network
Fraud in connection with the Muslim Brotherhood's economic and social programme for
Egypt's recovery, called Renaissance (al-Nahda)
Insulting the judiciary by naming a judge in a public speech and accusing him of
overseeing fraud in previous elections
Image copyrightAPImage captionMorsi was forced to sit in a soundproof glass dock after
disrupting the start of his first trial
At the start of his first trial, he shouted from the dock that he was the victim of a "military coup".
"I am the president of the republic, according to the constitution of the state, and I am forcibly
detained," he asserted.
Since then, Morsi has been forced to sit in soundproof glass cages in courtrooms, which officials
say are designed to prevent him disrupting proceedings.
Image captionSupporters of President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi have called for Morsi to be executed
The prosecution of Morsi is taking place amid a wider crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood,
which President Sisi has vowed to wipe out.
Morsi's supporters have said the trials are politically motivated and attempts to give legal cover
to a coup. They claim they are based on unreliable witnesses and scant evidence.
Human rights activists have said Morsi's right to prepare an adequate defence has also been
undermined.
In 2014, the UN warned that Egypt had "a judicial system where international fair trial guarantees
appear to be increasingly trampled upon" after more than 1,200 people were sentenced to death
in two mass trials "rife with procedural irregularities".
Image copyrightEPAImage captionThe Muslim Brotherhood's general guide, Mohamed Badie, has
been sentenced to death
Judges have already sentenced to death several other senior figures in the Muslim Brotherhood,
including its general guide, Mohammed Badie. However, none have so far been executed.
All death sentences have to be sent to the grand mufti, Egypt's highest religious authority, for his
opinion on whether they should stand. But even when the grand mufti gives his approval,
convictions are still open to appeal.
Experts also believe a death sentence for Morsi would be unlikely to be carried out. H A Hellyer of
the Brookings Centre for Middle East Policy said it would "represent an escalation by the Egyptian
authorities that they do not appear willing to engage in".
Brotherhood leader Amr Darrag said the confirmation of Morsi's death sentence was a symbol "of
the dark shadow of authoritarianism that is now cast back over Egypt".