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Mubarak back in court as Muslim Brotherhood leaders go on trial

Arab World Materials 25 August 2013 23:18 (UTC +04:00)
Former Egyptian president Hosny Mubarak was back in court Sunday for a retrial over alleged complicity in the killing of protesters, four days following his release from prison after settling a corruption case, dpa reported.
Mubarak back in court as Muslim Brotherhood leaders go on trial

Former Egyptian president Hosny Mubarak was back in court Sunday for a retrial over alleged complicity in the killing of protesters, four days following his release from prison after settling a corruption case, dpa reported.

Mubarak looked alert as he sat in a wheelchair inside a cage at a makeshift court on the outskirts of Cairo.

Mubarak, 85, is being retried in a case that centres on his alleged failure to prevent the killing of more than 800 protesters in the uprising that forced him out of power in 2011. He showed up in the dock along side his two sons, a former interior minister and six ex-security chiefs.

His supporters approached the dock during session breaks, chanting: "We love you, president, we love you, hero."

Mubarak did not appear at a previous hearing earlier this month because of the unrest in the country since the army deposed his successor, Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, on July 3.

The court Sunday ordered the formation of a committee of two army officers and a forensic expert to examine arms and evidence related to the case.

Presiding judge Mahmoud al-Rashidi announced that the hearings will be adjourned until September 14, the latest deferral since the retrial started in May.

Mubarak has been staying since Thursday at a Cairo military hospital, serving house arrest after his release from prison in a corruption case.

Revolutionary groups have condemned his release as a "deviation from the course of the revolution."

Another Cairo court Sunday began the trial of three top Islamist leaders charged with inciting the murder of nine protesters in June.

After a brief session, presiding judge Mahmoud Fahmy announced the trial postponed until October 29, as Muslim Brotherhood head Mohammed Badie and his deputies Khyrat al-Shater and Rashad Bayoumi could not be brought from prison for security reasons, judicial sources said.

The Muslim Brotherhood leaders are among hundreds of Islamists and Morsi supporters, who have been rounded up since his ouster.

The military deposed Morsi, Egypt's first democratically elected president, after millions of Egyptians took to the streets demanding he step down.

His toppling has triggered mass protests and street violence, leaving hundreds dead.

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