Egypt’s former president Mohammed Morsi, who was ousted by the army in 2013, has died in court, state TV says.
He reportedly fainted after a court session where he was facing espionage charges and subsequently died. He was 67.
Morsi was overthrown following mass protests a year after he took office as the country’s first democratically elected leader.
About Mohamed Morsi
He was an Egyptian politician who served as the fifth[1] President of Egypt, from 30 June 2012 to 3 July 2013, when General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi removed Morsi from office in the 2013 Egyptian coup d’état after the June 2013 Egyptian protests.[2]
As president, Morsi issued a temporary constitutional declaration in late November that in effect granted him unlimited powers and the power to legislate without judicial oversight or review of his acts as a pre-emptive move against the expected dissolution of the second constituent assembly by the Mubarak-era judges.[3]
The new constitution that was then hastily finalised by the Islamist-dominated constitutional assembly, presented to the president, and scheduled for a referendum, before the Supreme Constitutional Court could rule on the constitutionality of the assembly, was described by independent press agencies not aligned with the regime as an “Islamist coup”.[4]
These issues,[5] along with complaints of prosecutions of journalists and attacks on nonviolent demonstrators,[6] led to the 2012 Egyptian protests.[7][8] As part of a compromise, Morsi rescinded the decrees.[9]
In the referendum he held on the new constitution it was approved by approximately two thirds of voters.[10]
On 30 June 2013, protests erupted across Egypt, in which protesters called for the president’s resignation.[11][12][13]
In response to the events, Morsi was given a 48-hour ultimatum by the military to meet their demands and to resolve political differences, or else they would intervene by “implementing their own road map” for the country.[14]
He was unseated on 3 July by a military coup council consisting of Defense Minister Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei, the Grand Imam of Al Azhar Ahmed el-Tayeb, and Coptic Pope Tawadros II.[15][16]
The military suspended the constitution and appointed the President of the Supreme Constitutional Court of Egypt Adly Mansour as the interim-president.[17]
The Muslim Brotherhood protested against the military coup, but the pro-Morsi protests were crushed in the August 2013 Rabaa massacre in which at least 817 civilians were killed.[18] Opposition leader Elbaradei quit in protest of the massacre.[19]
Since his overthrow, Egyptian prosecutors have charged Morsi with various crimes and sought the death penalty, a move denounced by Amnesty International as “a charade based on null and void procedures.”[20] His death sentence was overturned in November 2016 and a retrial ordered.[21] According to Egyptian state media, Morsi died during a court hearing on 17 June 2019.[22][23]
CREDIT: BBC