CAIRO
An Egyptian court will deliver its verdict in the retrial of two Al Jazeera journalists charged with “broadcasting false news” on July 30, a judicial source said Monday.
Mohamed Fahmy, a naturalized Canadian national who has given up his Egyptian citizenship, and Egyptian citizen Baher Mohamed were both earlier convicted of “broadcasting false news” and “threatening Egypt’s national security.”
A third Al Jazeera journalist, Australian Peter Greste, who had faced the same raft of charges, was deported in January.
In February, an Egyptian court ordered the three reporters’ retrial.
The trio was originally detained in late 2013 at a Cairo hotel only days after Egyptian authorities branded the Muslim Brotherhood – the group from which ousted President Mohamed Morsi hails – a "terrorist" organization.
Several western governments and rights groups had called for the journalists' release amid an international solidarity campaign launched by Al Jazeera.
The Egyptian government accuses Qatar-based Al Jazeera of harboring bias in favor of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood group – an allegation the channel denies.
The latest developments come amid ongoing tension between Cairo and Doha over the latter's criticisms of Morsi's 2013 ouster – and subsequent imprisonment – by the Egyptian military.
