Egyptian Court Delays Mubarak verdict to November 29th

An Egyptian court has postponed the verdict in the retrial of deposed president Hosni Mubarak on charges of corruption and killing of hundreds of protesters during the 2011 uprising that toppled him.

The court on Saturday said the ruling for the 86-year-old Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for three decades, was postponed until November 29 due to the large amount of evidence.

The verdicts for seven of his former police commanders, as well as for his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, accused of corruption, were also delayed.

In August, Mubarak told the court that he never ordered the killing of protesters.

“I, Mohammed Hosni Mubarak, who is standing before you today, never handed down orders for the killing of protesters. I never handed down orders for the killing of Egyptians,” he said in his first speech to the court.

“I exhausted my life fighting against enemies of the homeland. I would never hand down orders for the killing of a single Egyptian citizen under any circumstances. Or hand down orders to wreak chaos of which I had been warning. I would never hand down orders to cause anarchy or a political vacuum.”

In June 2012, Mubarak and former interior minister Habib el-Adly were sentenced to life in prison for failing to prevent the deaths of more than 800 protesters during the 18-day uprising that began on January 25, 2011.

Youth leaders jailed

But an appeals court overturned his initial life sentence on a technicality, and ordered a retrial. The case has since been adjourned a number of times.

Mubarak’s sons were acquitted on corruption charges due to the expiry of a statute of limitations.

Mubarak’s successor, Mohamed Morsi, was himself overthrown by the military and imprisoned along with thousands of Muslim Brotherhood members and supporters during a crackdown in June 2013.

Youth leaders who spearheaded the anti-Mubarak revolt have been jailed for staging unauthorised protests by then-army chief Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who was elected as president in May this year.

Sisi has emphasised law and order at the expense of freedom to protest, a popular stance among Egyptians fed up with the chaos and economic ruin of their experiment with democracy.

Source: Aljazeera