Two Criminal Courts handed on Sunday heavy sentences to 165 defendants in charges relating to terrorism.
The Kafr Al-Sheikh Criminal Court sentenced 127 defendants to 10 years in prison for targeting and breaking into a church, a stadium and a police station in Kafr Al-Sheikh, following the forcible dispersal of two pro-Mohamed Morsi encampments in August last year.
A statement from the Prosecutor General said the 127 defendants were charged with breaking into the said facilities at gunpoint and torching them using Molotov cocktails.
The court also sentenced five 17-year-old minors to a suspended one year of hard labour for the same charges.
In August 2013, security forces forcibly dispersed two large sit-ins supporting former president Morsi. The violence in Greater Cairo spread quickly throughout the nation with clashes occurring between supporters of the former president, security forces and other citizens. In many parts of the country churches were targeted as well as the security forces.
The Shubra Al-Kheima Criminal Court also sentenced 37 defendants to 15 years in a maximum security prison and an EGP 20,000 fine for attempting to bomb a metro station on 6 October 2013. Their time in prison would be followed by five years of observation, according to Sunday’s court ruling. They are also obliged, alongside the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, to pay for the damages they caused the metro station.
The 38th defendant, a 16-year-old minor, was meanwhile sentenced to three years of hard labour followed by three more years of observation.
All 38 defendants were charged with illegal assembly, vandalism, “thuggery”, stalling public transportation and the possession of explosives, firearms and bladed weapons, according to the Prosecutor General.
The anniversary for the 6 October War in 2013 was a day of widespread violence, as pro-Morsi demonstrators clashed with security forces as they attempted to enter some of Egypt’s main squares but were prevented from doing so. The clashes left over 50 civilians dead.
