Egyptian Government Acknowledges Killings of Political Prisoners
August 19, 2013
The Egyptian government acknowledged today that its security forces had killed Islamist protesters in its custody yesterday. More than 30 protesters died in a prison van as they were being transported to a prison outside Egypt’s capital, Cairo. According to the Ministry of the Interior, the deaths were the consequence of the prisoners’ attempt to escape. The Muslim Brotherhood, however, characterizes the deaths as “assassinations,” claiming the men were tear-gassed and shot through the windows of a locked prison van.
The deaths were the government’s fourth mass killing of civilians since the military removed former President Mohamed Morsi from power on July 3. International affairs experts suggest that the killings are the latest indication that Egypt is careening toward civil war. With neither side willing to back down, there is no obvious political solution in sight. Street battles between Egyptian security forces and Morsi supporters among the Muslim Brotherhood have claimed more than 1,000 lives since August 14.
The Egyptian army removed Morsi from power in the face of massive anti-Morsi protests across the nation. Many Egyptians believed that Morsi was more interested in turning Egypt into an Islamist state than in dealing with the country’s many problems. The lack of public security under Morsi undermined the economy, which remains in a desperate state. Tourism, Egypt’s biggest industry, has all but dried up since the fall of President Hosni Mubarak in 2011. More than 1 million people were thrown out of work during Morsi’s one year in office as president.
Egypt's political turmoil began in 2011, when protests in Cairo's Tahrir Square against the government led to the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak. Since then, Egypt has lurched from one political crisis to the next. (© John Moore, Getty Images)
Additional World Book articles:
- Tahrir Square
- The Middle East: From Fall to Spring (a special report)
- Egypt (2011) (a Back in Time article)
- Egypt (2012) (a Back in Time article)
