Former Egyptian President Morsi Charged with ‘Inciting Murder’
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Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images(CAIRO) — Egypt’s top prosecutor has referred ousted President Mohammed Morsi for trial on charges of inciting the killing of opponents protesting outside his palace while he was in office.
The accusations against the former president go back to violence outside the presidential palace in Cairo in December 2012. Seven people were killed in those clashes.
Starting on December 4, 2012, more than 10,000 demonstrators rallied outside the palace after Morsi gave himself power to alter the country’s constitution. Morsi allegedly asked the Republican Guard and the minister of police to break up the protests, reports BBC News, but each refused.
Morsi’s aides are then accused of calling supporters to handle the task. Hundreds were injured in the ensuing clashes.
BBC News says that Morsi had previously been accused of premeditated murder when he and other members of the Muslim Brotherhood were freed from a Cairo prison as well as plotting attacks on jails in the uprising that ousted former President Hosni Mubarak.
No trial date has been announced.
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