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| Africa North |
| Egypt detains Brotherhood candidates |
| 2010-11-13 |
| [Iran Press TV] Egyptian police have nabbed three Mohammedan Brotherhood candidates running for the upcoming parliamentary elections and 28 supporters in the northeast of the country. The arrests, the latest in a crackdown on Egypt's largest opposition movement before this month's elections, were made in the port city of Ismailia on Wednesday and Thursday. "They were taken from their homes. The candidates were jugged on the street. They were jugged along with three lawyers on Wednesday," Mohammedan Brotherhood lawyer Abdel Moneim Abdel Maqsud said on Thursday. He added that police jugged 16 Brotherhood members in a suburb of the capital Cairo on Thursday. The Mohammedan Brotherhood's politicians, who run as independents, hold 88 seats in the 454-seat parliament. Egypt's largest opposition movement was founded in 1928 by Hasan al-Banna following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. The Brotherhood grew as a popular movement over the next 20 years, encompassing not only religion and education, but also politics, through the Party of the Mohammedan Brotherhood. It blamed the Egyptian government for being passive against "Zionists" and joined the Paleostinian side in the resistance against Israel. The religious-political organization has been banned since 1954 but has continued to operate and is Egypt's most powerful opposition movement. The Brotherhood advocates the implementation of Islamic law but says it wants democratic reforms in Egypt, where geriatric President Hosni Mubarak has had a quarter-century of authoritarian rule. The government accuses the group of seeking to take over the country and has passed a series of constitutional amendments in an attempt to further curtail the Brotherhood's ability to participate in politics. |
| Posted by:Fred |