Muslim Brotherhood's top leader charged with killings
By Pol O Gradaigh and Nehal El-Sherif, dpa
20.08.2013
Cairo (dpa) - Mohammed Badie, the supreme guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, Tuesday joined hundreds of his followers in prison as authorities escalated their arrest campaign against the organization which ruled Egypt until only seven weeks ago.
Police seized Badie in an early morning raid on an apartment in Rabaa al-Adawiya - the north-eastern Cairo area where police last week stormed a sit-in by supporters of ousted Islamist president Mohammed Morsi.
Badie was transferred to Tora prison in southern Cairo, where prosecutors interrogated him and ordered that he remain in detention for 15 days.
He faces charges related to the killing of anti-Morsi demonstrators outside the presidential palace in December and for inciting the storming of a Republican Guard building after Morsi's ouster.
Badie had been in hiding since the military ousted Morsi on July 3 following mass demonstrations against his rule.
His only appearance since then was a fiery speech to tens of thousands of Morsi supporters at Rabaa al-Adawiya.
The Muslim Brotherhood reacted with defiance to their leader's arrest. "Dr Mohammed Badie is one member of the Muslim Brotherhood," spokesman Ahmed Aref posted on his Facebook page.
Khaled Hanafy, an official at the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice party, refused to confirm or deny that hardliner Mahmoud Ezzat was appointed as the group's new Supreme guide.
"The brotherhood's ideology makes it (immune) to collapsing if one person disappears," Hanafy told reporters.
State-run newspaper al-Ahram quoted Interior Ministry spokesman Abdel-Fattah Othman as saying that Badie and a supporter had not resisted arrest, and that he was being "treated very respectfully."
Badie's son Ammar was killed Friday when a pro-Morsi protest degenerated into violent clashes. Badie did not attend the funeral.
The United States meanwhile denied that it was already withholding aid from Egypt after media reports indicated it had already begun withhholding aid in practice while not announcing a change in policy.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said a review of US aid recently ordered by President Barack Obama was still ongoing.
"That review has not concluded and published reports to the contrary that suggest aid to Egypt has been cut off are not accurate."
When asked whether aid had stopped during the review, Earnest stressed that US policy toward Egypt had not changed and that some aid was still being delivered to Egypt.
"Providing foreign assistance is not like a spigot. You don't turn it off and on or turn it up and down like a faucet," he said.
A spokesman for Senator Patrick Leahy said the lawmaker's "understanding is that aid to the Egyptian military has been halted, as required by law."
Obama was to meet Tuesday with his national security team to discuss the situation in Egypt, but no announcement on aid was imminent, Earnest said. European Union foreign ministers were also to meet Wednesday to discuss the bloc's response to the crisis in Egypt.
Authorities meanwhile continued their arrest campaign against the Islamist group's middle and lower-ranking members.
Local media reported that at least 200 were arrested in Cairo and other provinces, in addition to 1,400 people detained over the weekend.
The tumult has left at least 855 people dead across Egypt, including more than 100 security personnel.
The Brotherhood-led national alliance vowed to continue protesting.
"We are calling for a civil disobedience, and urge people to boycott all media, businessmen, companies and countries supporting the coup," said Magdy Qorqor, a leader in the New Labour Party, a member of the alliance.
Also to face trial is Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohammed ElBaradei, who is charged with betrayal of trust after his resignation as vice president in protest at the crackdown at Rabaa al-Adawiya.
The case against him was brought by Sayyid Atiq, head of criminal law in Helwan University, who argues that ElBaradei was appointed as a representative of the opposition and was obliged to refer his resignation to them.
ElBaradei left Cairo Sunday for Vienna, according to Al-Ahram, and refused to speak to reporters at the airport. His trial date set for September 19.
Meanwhile, the diplomatic spat between Cairo and Ankara continued, with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan claiming he had evidence of Israel's involvement in Morsi's overthrow.
“Who is behind this? Israel. We have evidence,” Erdogan said at a meeting of his Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP), citing a meeting between a French intellectual and the Israeli justice minister in France before the 2011 elections.
“‘The Muslim Brotherhood will not be in power even if they win the elections. Because democracy is not the ballot box’: This is what he said at that time,” Erdogan said, according to the Hurriyet daily.
