Egypt Condemns UN Comments on Death Verdicts

Egypt’s Foreign Ministry on Monday condemned the comments issued by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, regarding the latest death verdicts in the North African nation.

An Egyptian court has sentenced 75 prominent members and affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood to death, as part of a mass trial that included 739 people charged after the violent dispersal of a protest camp in support of former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

The verdict was announced on Saturday in Cairo’s heavily fortified Tora prison courthouse, after a trial Amnesty International has condemned as “a grotesque parody of justice”.

On Sunday, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet expressed her extreme concern over the decision, which, if carried out, she said, would amount to “a gross and irreversible miscarriage of justice.”

The Foreign Ministry said it, “considers this an unfortunate start for the new high commissioner in carrying out her duties, as the statement deviates from the standards of objectivity and professionalism.”

The Egyptian government rejected claims that “impinge,” directly or indirectly, upon the integrity of the Egyptian judiciary, as well as the statement’s subscription to the “lies and fabrications of the terrorist Brotherhood group,” the ministry said.
Last weekend verdict ended a prolonged period of pre-trial detention, long past the two-year legal limit in Egypt, amid a crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood group.