Capital punishment is a legal penalty in Egypt. The state carried out at least 44 executions in 2016, at least 35 in 2017, and at least 43 in 2018, according to Amnesty International.[1][2] The method of execution is hanging for civilian convictions, and by firing squad for convictions by commissioned military personnel at the time of duty.
The Grand Mufti of Egypt Shawki Ibrahim Abdel-Karim Allam, is responsible under Egyptian law for reviewing all death sentences in Egypt. Legally, his opinion is consultative and not binding on the presiding court that handed down the death sentence.[3]
Venues
Executions by hanging have generally been carried out at the Cairo Central Prison. However prisons of Wadi Al Natrun and Burj Al Arab both house an execution chamber.[4]
Amid political unrest following the July 2013 removal of Mohamed Morsi from presidential office (which itself occurred following mass protests against his rule), a court sentenced 683 suspected Muslim Brotherhood members to death on 28 April 2014, including the group's supreme guide, Mohammed Badie, and confirmed the death sentences of 37 of 529 alleged supporters previously condemned. The defendants were accused of violence at two sit-ins in Cairo, held by supporters of Morsi, where the police conducted sit-in dispersals on 14 August 2013. Mohamed Elmessiry, an Amnesty International researcher monitoring the cases, said that they "lacked basic fair trial guarantees". The defendants from the first case whose death sentences were not upheld were each sentenced to 25 years in prison.[9][unreliable source?]
Judge Saeed Youssef first attracted international condemnation and prompted an outcry from foreign human rights groups after he handed down the initial sentence for the 529 defendants on March 24th, following a brief trial perceived as having been marked by irregularities.[10] Later, he reversed 492 of those 529 death sentences, commuting most of them to life in prison.
Egyptian law requires that death sentences be confirmed by the presiding judge after reviewing the opinion of the Grand Mufti of Egypt, the country's leading official legal expert on religious matters. The Mufti's opinion to the judge is confidential. The guilty verdict and death sentences are still subject to review by appellate courts. "The case killed the credibility of the Egyptian judicial system," said Elmessiry of Amnesty International.[9]
2020 mass executions
Amnesty International accused Egyptian authorities of executing 57 people in October and November alone, nearly double the number recorded in the whole of 2019. Amnesty said the spike in executions followed a botched breakout attempt in September at the Tora Prison in Cairo. Four police officers and four death-row prisoners died in the attempt.[11][12]
Amnesty International's annual global review of death penalty usage ranked Egypt as the world's third most frequent executioner in 2020. Egypt executed at least 107 people in 2020 following trials that Amnesty International has called "grossly unfair" and confessions perceived as forced, as lawyers could not meet their clients or conduct proper investigations due to the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.[13]
September 2020 death sentences
On 8 September 2020, a court in Egypt sentenced 75 people to death and 47 others to life imprisonment. They were charged with murder or membership in a terrorist group.[14] The British newspaper The Independent has reported that Najia Bounaim of Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa division described the court's sentence as "disgraceful" and "a mockery of justice".[15]
↑ Shayanian, Sara (December 26, 2017). "Egypt executes 15 militants over terrorism charges". UPI. The militants were executed at the Prison of Wadi Al Natrun, west of Cairo, and the Prison of Burj Al Arab in the Mediterranean Sea city of Alexandria.
Capital punishment is a legal punishment in Iran. Crimes punishable by death include murder; rape; child molestation; homosexuality; pedophilia; drug trafficking; armed robbery; kidnapping; terrorism; burglary; incestuous relationships; fornication; prohibited sexual relations; sodomy; sexual misconduct; prostitution; plotting to overthrow the Islamic government; political dissidence; sabotage; arson; rebellion; apostasy; adultery; blasphemy; extortion; counterfeiting; smuggling; speculating; disrupting production; recidivist consumption of alcohol; producing or preparing food, drink, cosmetics, or sanitary items that lead to death when consumed or used; producing and publishing pornography; using pornographic materials to solicit sex; recidivist false accusation of capital sexual offenses causing execution of an innocent person; recidivist theft; certain military offenses ; "waging war against God"; "spreading corruption on Earth"; espionage; and treason. Iran carried out at least 977 executions in 2015, at least 567 executions in 2016, and at least 507 executions in 2017. In 2018 there were at least 249 executions, at least 273 in 2019, at least 246 in 2020, at least 290 in 2021, at least 553 in 2022, and at least 309 so far in 2023.
Human rights in Egypt are guaranteed by the Constitution of the Arab Republic of Egypt under the various articles of Chapter 3. The country is also a party to numerous international human rights treaties, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. However, the state of human rights in the country has been criticized both in the past and the present, especially by foreign human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. As of 2022, Human Rights Watch has declared that Egypt's human rights crises under the government of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, is "one of its worst ... in many decades", and that "tens of thousands of government critics, including journalists, peaceful activists, and human rights defenders, remain imprisoned on abusive 'terrorism' charges, many in lengthy pretrial detention." International human rights organizations, such as the aforementioned HRW and Amnesty International, have alleged that as of January 2020, there are some 60,000 political prisoners in Egypt. Other complaints made are of authorities harassing and detaining "relatives of dissidents abroad" and use of "vague 'morality' charges to prosecute LGBT people, female social media influencers, and survivors of sexual violence". The Egyptian government has frequently rejected such criticism, denying that any of the prisoners it holds are political prisoners.
Capital punishment is a legal penalty in South Korea. As of December 2012, there were at least 60 people in South Korea on death row. The method of execution is hanging.
Mohammed Badie is the eighth Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Mohamed Elbeltagy is an Egyptian physician, professor at Al-Azhar university and Muslim Brotherhood politician. He was a Member of Parliament from 2005 to 2010 and 2011 to 2012, and constitute assembly 2012. Currently the general secretary of the Freedom and Justice Party.
Capital punishment is a legal criminal penalty in Somalia, a nation in East Africa. Legally sanctioned executions of the death penalty in Somalia are carried out by shooting, in accordance with the 1962 Somali Penal Code and the Military Penal Code. Sharia and Islamic tribunals are recognised in Somalia in parallel with the civil law: these would have the authority to order execution by other means, such as beheading and stoning. Since at least the start of the 21st century, all executions by such methods have been applied ad-hoc, without official sanction, by non-state insurgent militias, in the context of an unstable government, and the ongoing civil war in the country. A number of these extrajudicial executions have violated sharia legal principles and appear to have a conflict-related tactical aim of inciting fear amongst civilians. Both officially sanctioned and extrajudicial executions by firing squad often occur in public.
Mohamed Mohamed Morsi Eissa al-Ayyat was an Egyptian politician, engineer, and professor who served as the fifth president of Egypt, from 2012 to 2013, when General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi removed him from office in a coup d'état after protests in June. An Islamist affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood organization, Morsi led the Freedom and Justice Party from 2011 to 2012.
On 1 February 2012, a massive riot occurred at Port Said Stadium in Port Said, Egypt, following an Egyptian Premier League football match between Al Masry and Al Ahly. Seventy-four people were killed and more than 500 injured after thousands of Al Masry fans stormed the stadium stands and the pitch following a 3–1 victory by their club and violently attacked Ahly fans, using clubs, stones, machetes, knives, bottles, and fireworks, trapping them inside the Al Ahly partition of the stadium. Many of the deaths were due to police refusal to open the stadium gates, trapping the Ahly fans inside, leaving some to die, and others being killed in a stampede while trying to escape. Civil unrest and severe clashes continued until 11 February, but general strikes ended on 13 February. Riots erupted in Cairo, Alexandria, and Suez. Police fired tear gas at protesters; thus, clashes erupted on the streets due to tear gas battles. Unrest calmed and ended on 13 February.
The 2012–2013 Egyptian protests were part of the crisis in Egypt including the June 2013 protests, the July 2013 coup d'état, and part of the post-coup unrest. They saw varying opposition against three contiguous heads of state; namely, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), Muslim Brotherhood, and the de facto ruling Egyptian Armed Forces.
Protests against the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état erupted in July 2013. Immediately following the removal of President Mohamed Morsi by the Egyptian Armed Forces on 3 July 2013 amid demonstrations against Morsi's rule, many protesters amassed near the Rabia Al-Adawiya Mosque to call for Morsi's return to power and condemn the military, while others demonstrated in support of the military and interim government. Deadly clashes such as Rabaa massacre continued for several days, with three particularly bloody incidents being described by officials as "massacres" perpetrated by security forces. During the month of Ramadan, prime minister Hazem al-Beblawy threatened to disperse the ongoing Pro-Morsi sit-ins in Rabaa al-Adaweya square and al-Nahda square. The government crackdown of these protests occurred in a violent dispersal on 14 August 2013. In mid-August, the violence directed by the army towards the protesters escalated, with hundreds killed, and the government declaring a month-long nighttime curfew.
On the morning of 8 July 2013 at the Republican Guard headquarters in Cairo, Egypt there was a clash between protesters seeking the return of deposed President Mohamed Morsi, and the military, who were protecting the institution. According to the Forensic Medical Authority, at least 61 protesters seeking the return of Morsi to power were killed and more than 435 injured in the clashes, in what has been deemed a massacre by the Muslim Brotherhood and those opposed to the recent coup d'état. Amnesty International has condemned the military's disproportionate use of force, with a spokesperson stating, "Even if some protesters used violence, the response was disproportionate and led to the loss of life and injury among peaceful protesters."
Wadi el-Natrun Prison is an Egyptian prison complex in the Beheira Governorate, north of Cairo. It consists of two separate facilities 5 kilometers apart.
Hisham Muhammad Zaki Barakat was Prosecutor General of Egypt from 2013 to 2015. During his term as state prosecutor, he was responsible for thousands of controversial prosecutions, including several widely deemed politically motivated resulting in death sentences for hundreds of Muslim Brotherhood members and supporters of deposed Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi. He was assassinated in a car bombing on 29 June 2015.
Mohamed Ibrahim Moustafa, often referred to simply as Mohamed Ibrahim was the Minister of Interior of Egypt, from January 2013 until March 2015.
Tora Prison is an Egyptian prison complex for criminal and political detainees, located in Tora, Egypt. The complex is situated in front of the Tora El Balad metro station. The main buildings in the Tora Prison complex are Tora Agricultural Prison, Tora Liman, Tora Istiqbal (reception), Tora El Mahkoum and Tora Supermax prison, also known as Scorpion Prison.
The Kerdasa massacre refers to the killing of twelve Egyptian security personnel in August 2013 in Kerdasa's main police station, a town in Giza.
Between the months of March and April 2014, a court in Minya, Egypt, has recommended the death sentence to hundreds of members and supporters of the banned Muslim Brotherhood over an attack on a police station in December 2013. The defendants included Mohamed Badie, the group's top leader, whose sentence was confirmed on June 21, 2014, along with 181 of the brotherhood's supporters. This came two months after the previous ruling decided to refer the case to the Egypt's Grand Mufti Shawki Ibrahim.
The following lists events that happened during 2015 in Egypt.
The Arab Sharkas case is the name given to the military trial of nine men in Egypt in August 2014. Six defendants were sentenced to death in October, and executed in May 2015.
Capital punishment is a legal penalty in the Comoros. Currently, however, the country has a de facto moratorium in place; although the death penalty remains in the nation's penal code, it has not been used since the 1990s.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
