(AFP PHOTO/KHALED DESOUKI)
Former president Mohamed Morsi and 25 other prominent politicians and public figures were referred to court on Sunday on charges of “insulting the judiciary and its men,” according to state-owned MENA.
The list of defendants includes a number of Muslim Brotherhood leaders including former supreme guide of the group Mahdi Akef, Chairman of the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party Saad Al-Katatny, senior member Mohamed Al-Beltagy, and Muslim Brotherhood lawyers Ahmed Abou Baraka and Sobhi Saleh.
Other Islamists including Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya member Assem Abdel Maged, Al-Wasat Party member Mohamed Mahsoub, ultraconservative preacher Wagdy Ghoneim and Noha Othman Al-Zeiny.
Former judge Mahmoud Al-Khodeiry and lawyers Mohamed Moneib Ginidy, Mansour Al-Zayat, Amir Hamdy Salem and Hamdy Al-Fakrany are also included in the case.
Politicians are also implicated in the case, which includes former lawmakers Amr Hamzawy, Mostafa Al-Naggar, Mahmoud Al-Saqqa, Al-Wasat Party chairman Essam Sultan and Mamdouh Ismail.
The case also involves media personalities and journalists, including Abdel Halim Qandil, former Misr 25 presenter Nour El-Din Abdel Hafez, Ahmed Hassan Al-Sharqawy, owner Abdel Rahman Al-Qaradawy and presenter of Faraeen satellite channel Tawfik Okasha.
Prominent activist Alaa Abdel Fattah, who is already detained on trial for allegedly violating the controversial new Protest Law, is also a defendant in the case.
A number of those involved in the case are already detained pending trial or investigations for other cases, while some, including Abdel Maged and Ghoneim, are currently not in Egypt.
