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Egypt’s Morsi orders release of detainees

Cairo [AFP]

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi has ordered the release of 572 people detained by the military, the official MENA news agency reports.

Morsi, who was sworn in last month as Egypt’s first elected civilian president, ‘issued an order to pardon 572 people convicted by the military justice’, MENA said.

The president had ordered the formation of a committee to review the cases of civilians tried by the military.

A total of 11,879 Egyptians have been detained by the military since last year’s uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak, according to figures issued by the committee. Of these, 9714 have since been released.

Activists and international rights groups have repeatedly called for the end of military trials of civilians.

‘International law is crystal-clear on this: no civilian, regardless of the crime, should be tried by a military court,’ Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch, said this week.

She urged Morsi to take a ‘principled human rights stance and pardon all civilians convicted by military tribunals’.

Morsi was sworn in on June 30, taking over from a military council that oversaw the transition from Mubarak’s rule.

But the president has been locked in a power struggle with the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces which issued a constitutional declaration – that acts as a temporary charter – giving the military sweeping powers.

‘Military trials and arrests of civilians by the military have continued despite the June 30 handover to civilian authority,’ Human Rights Watch said.

The committee formed by Morsi does not however have the mandate to look into cases of military trials and arrests of civilians after the the handover date.

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20. July 2012 by admin
Categories: World News |

1. 

   geoffff says July 20, 2012 at 5:26 pm

   “Activists and international rights groups have repeatedly called for the end of military trials of civilians.”

   An end to military trials? And replace them with what? Trial by clerics associated with the Muslim Brotherhood?

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BXSOGCFaVfQ

   When “activists and international rights groups” start to genuinely support human rights, all human rights, including the right to be free of lunatic violent religious bigotry of the type that has duly come to power in Egypt, then perhaps they might have something to say worth hearing.

   Otherwise they should be ignored. They just make bad things worse. Just like the Australian Greens.

   Geoffff’s Joint Bar Grill

   http://geofffff.blogspot.com.au/

   Your comment is awaiting moderation.

   
   

   
   

   Of course my comment is awaiting  moderation. Echonetdaily is associated with the Australian Greens.  For the Greens racism and Jew murder is moderation so long as it doesn't happen in the  Byron Shire while anybody is actually looking..