A court on Wednesday slapped 26 people with the death penalty after convicting them of forming a "terrorist cell" that targeted Egypt's strategic Suez Canal, judicial sources said.
The court sentenced 26 out of 27 defendants in the case to death. Legal sources told Anadolu Agency that the verdict was still subject to appeal.
All the defendants were tried in absentia, the sources said, adding that defense lawyers had not attended the session.
Investigations of the defendants began in February of last year. They were later released pending trial.
The defendants were charged with threatening national security by establishing a "terrorist cell" that sought to target ships passing through the canal, which is vital to international shipping.
The defendants, the source said, are not linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, which the government has blamed for a series of deadly bombings since last July's ouster of president Mohamed Morsi – a Brotherhood leader – by the army.
Since death sentences are involved, the court has scheduled a March 19 session to ratify the ruling.
According to the prosecution's referral order, members of the "terrorist cell" had operated between 2004 and 2009, during the tenure of autocratic president Hosni Mubarak, who was ousted in 2011.
Their activities, the referral order said, had been centered in Cairo, Daqahliya and Damietta.
Ahmed Mafrah, researcher at the Geneva-based Alkarama human rights foundation, condemned the delivery of the verdict in the absence of the defense team.
"A death sentence issued from the first court session suggests that accuracy in Egyptian courts is in danger, especially in sensitive verdicts that deal with the right to life," Mafrah told Anadolu Agency.
The presiding judge in the case, legal sources said, was also presiding over two of the three trials in which ousted president Mohamed Morsi is a defendant.
englishnews@aa.com.tr
