Egyptian court gives life term to Muslim Brotherhood leader

A senior leader of Egypt’s outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group was convicted on terror charges and sentenced to life in prison, the country’s state-owned news agency reported.

According to the Middle East News Agency, a Cairo court found Mahmoud Ezzat, the acting supreme guide of the country’s oldest Islamist organisation, guilty of terror acts that followed the 2013 military overthrow of Egypt’s first democratically elected president, Mohammed Morsi.

Last summer, 76-year-old Ezzat was arrested after police found him hiding in an apartment on the outskirts of Cairo.

According to authorities at the time, a search of the apartment uncovered computers and mobile phones with encrypted software that allowed Ezzat to communicate with group members in Egypt and abroad.

Documents with “destructive plans” were also found, police said.

Ezzat had been at large since the summer of 2013, after the military removed Mr Morsi, who hailed from Brotherhood ranks.

Mr Morsi’s short-lived rule proved divisive and provoked mass protests nationwide.

Mr Morsi died after collapsing in court during one of his trials in June 2019.

Ezzat was believed to have fled the country along with many of the group’s leaders following the crackdown on their organisation.

He was named the group’s acting leader in August 2013.

He was convicted of several terror-related crimes and sentenced twice to death in absentia.

Following his arrest, he was retried, as Egyptian law dictates.

Credit: PA News

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Categories: Egypt, Mahmout Ezzat, Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood, News

Egyptian court gives life term to Muslim Brotherhood leader

A senior leader of Egypt’s outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group was convicted on terror charges and sentenced to life in prison, the country’s state-owned news agency reported.

According to the Middle East News Agency, a Cairo court found Mahmoud Ezzat, the acting supreme guide of the country’s oldest Islamist organisation, guilty of terror acts that followed the 2013 military overthrow of Egypt’s first democratically elected president, Mohammed Morsi.

Last summer, 76-year-old Ezzat was arrested after police found him hiding in an apartment on the outskirts of Cairo.

According to authorities at the time, a search of the apartment uncovered computers and mobile phones with encrypted software that allowed Ezzat to communicate with group members in Egypt and abroad.

Documents with “destructive plans” were also found, police said.

Ezzat had been at large since the summer of 2013, after the military removed Mr Morsi, who hailed from Brotherhood ranks.

Mr Morsi’s short-lived rule proved divisive and provoked mass protests nationwide.

Mr Morsi died after collapsing in court during one of his trials in June 2019.

Ezzat was believed to have fled the country along with many of the group’s leaders following the crackdown on their organisation.

He was named the group’s acting leader in August 2013.

He was convicted of several terror-related crimes and sentenced twice to death in absentia.

Following his arrest, he was retried, as Egyptian law dictates.

Credit: PA News

The post Egyptian court gives life term to Muslim Brotherhood leader appeared first on Faith Matters.

Categories: Egypt, Mahmout Ezzat, Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood, News

Woman, 18, arrested in France over ‘plot’ targeting church

French anti-terrorism investigators said that an 18-year-old woman arrested over the Easter weekend was suspected of planning an attack on a church.

New details have emerged about the teen, who was living in Beziers, in southern France, and is suspected of plotting an attack targeting nearby Montpellier over Easter.

On Thursday, anti-terrorism officials said that during a search of her home they found a photo of the schoolteacher beheaded by a radical Islamist in October.

Samuel Paty was murdered after showing caricatures of the prophet of Islam to his class.

Officials also said that bomb-making materials were found in the apartment, as well as photos of “armed jihadists”, a diagram of a nearby church and handwritten notes referring to the Nazis and the Islamic State group.

The teenager, who has not been identified, was not previously known to authorities.

Authorities stressed that no constructed explosives were found.


Read more: New arrest by French investigators probing church attack in Nice

Students helped killer find teacher who was beheaded, says French prosecutor

The post Woman, 18, arrested in France over ‘plot’ targeting church appeared first on Faith Matters.

Categories: armed Jihadists, Beziers, France, News, Samuel Paty

Muslim engineer wins religious discrimination claim after bogus extremism referral

A Muslim engineer at a supply plant for nuclear reactors received a £3,500 payout for direct religious discrimination after a false rumour spread from staff to management resulted in counter-terror police visiting Mo Master at his home.

Master, who had worked at Springfields Fuels in Preston for 28 years, had taken a voluntary redundancy payment of around £70,000 in February 2018, citing allegations about the loss of flexible working to attend Friday prayers and that a colleague had said: “we live in a Christian country who has given you permission to go and pray during working hours” which the tribunal ruled were out of time.

An extension, however, was given so Mr Master could appeal the discriminatory Prevent referral, which occurred after Simon Johnson, the plant’s head of security, contacted the external regular, the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR), after spurious rumours persisted that Master had said that British soldiers based in the Middle East “should die”.

Plain-clothed officers attended the address of Mr Master three months later in May 2018, who was unaware of any referral. The ninety-minute meeting, described in the documentation as being respectful on both sides, included questions about Master’s religious observance, whether his children were required to fast, and his friendship networks, which he accepted the police were entitled to ask and that he should respond. His wife and father had been present throughout the meeting, which caused the latter distress, as this was the only time police had visited their property. The police were satisfied that the matter required no further action, and according to evidence submitted by Mr Master, officers allegedly expressed that the matter was a “waste of their time”. Police had also expressed ‘disquiet‘ about waiting until to May to investigate a report submitted in January.

The 25-page judgment made clear that the rumour arose from “an unknown source that was allowed to persist and circulate and was now being passed up the management chain”.

The judgment added no context, explanation, or evidence of when the rumour began or even who made the report to management, nor could the respondent explain its origin.

Judge Mark Leach noted: “Had the claimant not been Muslim, this rumour would not have persisted to the extent that it did”.

The call made to the ONR was deemed “little more than a kneejerk reaction to being presented with unsubstantiated allegation” about an “employee making an extremist comment and information about the same employee displaying behaviour of greater religious observance” as no efforts were made internally to investigate before contacting the ONR, or even after that.

Nor had the ONR in this referral been told that the rumour had an unknown source and that it was unsubstantiated – or that no such issues had arisen during Mr Master’s long years of employment.

Judge Leach expressed surprise that no documents or email to the ONR had were generated, or even what the ONR had said in response before making their Prevent referral.

The unfavourable and potential for less favourable treated concerned the persistence of the false rumour about the British troops comment and the passing of their personal data (including their home address), his religion, and attributing the false comment which would lessen their standing with others, even though such comments were baseless.

The tribunal found that a significant factor in the rumour persisting was that Mr Master was Muslim, as had a non-Muslim employee made this comment (the hypothetical comparator), the rumour would not have persisted, and, therefore, they concluded, the climate of a difficult management issue to one of security would not have existed.

Master, however, must pay his former employers £7,622 in costs after making a series of other claims that the tribunal dismissed, including disability discrimination and constructive dismissal.

Tell MAMA continues to document a rise in discrimination reports, notably in workplaces in recent years and provides a free tool kit to download, produced in partnership with the Yorkshire & North Derbyshire branch of the GMB trade union.

Other case studies highlighted by Tell MAMA include other forms of discrimination towards Muslim individuals under a broader securitisation framework. And the misuse of safeguarding protocols regarding children, as highlighted in previous annual reports.

 

 

 

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Categories: discrimination, Discrimination at work, News, Prevent