Egypt court gives long jail sentences to protesters

An Egyptian court has given a group of dissidents and anti-government activists lengthy jail terms, ranging from five years to life in prison, sources say.
On Thursday, the court in Sohag sentenced 16 protesters to five years in jail, handed a 10-year
term to another and sentenced three others to life in prison, the sources added. The court acquitted three defendants in the case.
Judicial sources say the accused men were found guilty of violent acts during street protests in Sohag Province.
The sentences were handed down a day after a court in Giza sentenced a dozen anti-government protesters to death and 10 others to life in prison on charges of involvement in the killing of a police officer.
On June 19, an Egyptian court sentenced leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohamed Badie, and 13 other Brotherhood members to death.
Hundreds of people have been sentenced to death during mass trials across Egypt over the past few months
International bodies and human rights groups have already denounced the rulings as a grotesque example of the shortcomings of Egypt's justice system.
The UN Human Rights Council has also repeatedly expressed concern over the Egyptian security forces’ heavy-handed crackdown and the killing of peaceful anti-government protesters.
Since the ouster of former Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, on July 3 last year, Egypt has been the scene of anti-government protests with continuous clashes between security forces and Morsi’s supporters.
Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically-elected president, was toppled in a military coup led by Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Egypt’s current president and then army commander.
Sisi is accused of leading the suppression of Muslim Brotherhood supporters as hundreds of them have been killed in clashes with Egyptian security forces over the last year.