|
 Relations between Qatar, a Gulf Arab state, and Egypt have been
icy since July 2013, when Egypt's then-army chief Abdel Fattah
al-Sisi toppled Mursi after protests against his rule.
Qatar had supported Mursi, who is already in jail along with
thousands of Brotherhood members, many of whom have been sentenced
to death on separate charges.
Security sources had said last month that Egypt was investigating
Mursi in connection with documents they said were leaked to Qatar
and its satellite news channel Al Jazeera.
The Egyptian public prosecutor's office said on Saturday its secret
investigation had unearthed enough evidence of espionage to charge
Mursi and nine others in a criminal court.
"The inquiries ... exposed humiliating facts and the extent of the
largest conspiracy and treason carried out by the terrorist
Brotherhood organization against the nation through a network of
spies," it said in a three-page statement.
The public prosecutor said Mursi's aides were involved in leaking to
Qatari intelligence and Al Jazeera, documents which exposed the
location of and weapons held by the Egyptian armed forces and
detailed the country's foreign and domestic policies.
The Qatari Foreign Ministry in Doha did not immediately respond to
requests for comment on the accusations. Al Jazeera, which has been
banned from Egypt, has denied any bias in reporting events there or
any role in aiding the Brotherhood.
It was not immediately possible to obtain a Brotherhood comment as
most of the group's leaders are in Egyptian jails.
While Sisi has gone on to election as president, Mursi and other
Brotherhood leaders as well as the leading lights of the 2011
popular uprising that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak, many of them
secular activists, now languish in jail.
Hopes of democratic change inspired by the revolt in the most
populous Arab country have since faded.
Sisi promised during his election campaign that the Muslim
Brotherhood would cease to exist under his rule.
Egyptian security forces killed hundreds of Brotherhood supporters
during protests against Mursi's ouster and thousands of others have
since been jailed.
Egypt's oldest Islamist movement, once among Egypt's most formidable
political forces, has been branded a terrorist group and its assets
have been seized by the state. The Brotherhood formally renounced
violence as a means of political change decades ago and has denied
any role in more recent bloodshed.
[to top of second column] |
THE SECRETARY, HIS DAUGHTER AND THE AIR STEWARD
In a detailed statement, the prosecutor said his inquiry had found
that Mursi's secretary Amin al-Srifi abused his position to slip
documents from Egypt's security agencies to Jordanian Al Jazeera
journalist Alaa Sabalan via his own daughter Karima and four other
intermediaries.
It said Sabalan later flew to Doha and met with Al Jazeera news
editor Ibrahim Hilal and a senior Qatari intelligence officer and a
deal was reached for Mursi's aides to hand over the documents in
return for $1 million.
It added that part of that sum was paid after documents were handed
over at Doha airport by an Egyptair steward who acted as a
go-between. Subsequent interrogations had also linked Mursi and his
office manager Ahmed Abdelatti to the case, it said.
Egypt's public prosecutor charged Mursi and his two aides,
Abdelatti and Srifi, as well as seven others including Sabalan and
the air steward in the case. Three of the accused, including Sabalan
and senior Jazeera editor Hilal, are at large and the prosecutor
called for their arrest pending trial.
Egypt's rulers are deeply suspicious of Qatar and anyone who
supports the Brotherhood. Egyptian authorities have long since
closed down the Al Jazeera office in Cairo.
Earlier this year, an Egyptian court jailed three Al Jazeera
journalists for up to 10 years on charges of aiding "a terrorist
group" by broadcasting misinformation that harmed national security.
Al Jazeera has said the charges are baseless.
(Additional reporting by Angus McDowall in Riyadh, Editing by Mark
Heinrich)
[© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2014 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
