Death sentences in Egypt show anti-democratic nature of regime: Turkish FM

KONYA/ANKARA

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Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu has expressed his regret about an Egyptian court verdict that has sentenced to death 529 supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi, while maintaining that the verdict released after a rather quick hearing displayed the anti-democratic and unlawful nature of the post-coup regime.

“Actually, even this ruling reveals how that the process in Egypt, the approach displayed after the coup, the process and the coup administration are anti-democratic and far from being lawful,” Davutoğlu said, while speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an election rally in his hometown of Konya.

“If 529 people have been sentenced to death in a country, then there is a need to ask this too: Who will pay for those who were martyred at Rabaa al-Adawiya Square? In this regard, it is really a saddening development,” Davutoğlu added.

The minister was referring to the killings of hundreds of people in August 2013, at the Rabaa al-Adawiya Square in Cairo, when Egyptian security forces attacked a sit-in by Muslim Brotherhood members which had begun in July after the overthrow of President Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.