Egypt's Morsi referred to criminal court over spying charges

Egypt's Prosecutor General Hesham Barakat referred Wednesday deposed President Mohamed Morsi and other leading Muslim Brotherhood figures to the criminal court over charges of "espionage," state-run MENA news agency reported. Among the other senior Brotherhood leaders were the group's supreme guide Mohamed Badie, his two deputies Khairat al-Shater and Mahmoud Ezzat, and former parliament speaker Saad al-Katatni. The Public Prosecution accuses them of spying for foreign bodies, including the Islamist Hamas Movement which rules the Gaza Strip, in a move to curb "terrorist" acts in the country. They are also charged with revealing classified military information to foreign bodies and financing and providing armed training for "terrorists" to achieve the goals of the international Muslim Brotherhood. Also, Morsi and 14 other senior Brotherhood members are currently being tried for allegedly killing protesters outside the presidential palace in early December 2012. In other cases, Badie and many leaders of the group are accused of inciting violence that led to the killing of anti-Islamist protesters as well as police and military personnel on different occasions following Morsi's removal. Morsi was ousted by the military on July 3 after nationwide protests against his one-year rule and was detained by the army. Other top Brotherhood leaders were arrested in a subsequent crackdown against radicals. Since then, the country has been in a state of political and security instability and witnessing a fierce conflict between the Brotherhood's supporters, who consider Morsi's ouster a military coup against legitimacy, and the police and military forces. Morsi's supporters held massive open-ended sit-ins in two major squares in Cairo and Giza to demand his reinstatement, but security forces dispersed the two camps in mid-August, leaving over 1,000 protesters dead. The former president's loyalists also plan to either boycott the upcoming referendum on a new constitution drafted to replace the 2012 charter or vote against it.