An Egyptian court on Thursday sought advice from the grand mufti, Egypt's top religious authority, on the possible execution of Muslim Brotherhood's top leader Mohamed Badie and 13 others charged with inciting violence, judicial sources have said.
The 14 defendants are accused of belonging to an outlawed group that aims to carry out terrorist acts and committed murder and incitement to violence during deadly clashes in the Giza province last summer.
Other defendants in the case include leading senior Brotherhood members Mohamed al-Beltagi and Essam al-Erian, former supply minister and Brotherhood member Bassem Ouda, and Salafist preacher Safwat Hegazi.
The court set August 3 for issuing a ruling in the case after receiving a reply from the mufti. Most defendants remain in detention pending other trials. Six, however, remain at large.
When the judge read out the referral to the mufti order on Thursday, the defendants inside the dock shouted "Allahu Akbar" ("God is Great").
"Those who died in Rabaa are not inferior to us in any way," Badie said from inside the dock, referring to hundreds of supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi killed during the forcible dispersal of a Cairo sit-in in August of last year. This is the second time Badie's file is referred to the mufti.
On April 28, the Brotherhood leader's file was referred to the mufti, along with those of 682 Morsi supporters, by a Minya court over charges of committing violence and attacking a Minya police station.
The Minya court should issue its verdict in the case on June 21 after receiving a reply from the mufti, whose opinion is not compulsory.
Last December, Egypt's army-backed interim government designated the 86-year-old Muslim Brotherhood a "terrorist" group, blaming it for a string of deadly bombings to which the group has denied any connection.
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