CAIRO
Leaders of the pro-democracy National Alliance for the Defense of Legitimacy has denounced a candidacy by former army chief Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi to run for president, saying the move reflects that the ouster of elected president Mohamed Morsi was a "military coup".
"This shows the world that what happened on July 3 was a military coup," Alaa Abul-Nasr, a senior leader of the Construction and Development Party, the political army of Egypt's Gamaa Islamiya, told Anadolu Agency over the phone on Wednesday.
Al-Sisi, who is seen as the chief architect of Morsi's ouster last summer, resigned on Wednesday and unveiled his intention to run in Egypt's upcoming presidential election.
"Al-Sisi's resignation will not exonerate him from blame for the bloodshed he caused or stop the relatives of the victims from demanding justice," Abul-Nasr said.
Hundreds of pro-Morsi demonstrators were killed when their protest camps were violently dispersed by security forces in Cairo mid-August.
Abul-Nasr argued that supporters of Morsi's ouster should learn that they were defending a "fascist military coup that killed thousands of people and now seeks to take power".
For his part, Emam Youssef, a senior member of the Salafist Asala Party, said al-Sisi's presidential candidacy is part of a wider plan for "usurping" the constitutional legitimacy.
"This included the ouster of the elected president, dissolving the elected parliament and killing and detaining thousands of people," Youssef told AA.
By Islam Mosaad
englishnews@aa.com.tr
