Nasr City misdemeanour court decided on Thursday to postpone the review of a case filed against former vice president for international relations, Mohamed ElBaradei, to 19 October. The case, filed by Dr. Sayed Ateeq, head of the Criminal Law Department at Helwan University's Faculty of Law, charges ElBaradei with breach of "the national trust" after he resigned on 14 August, in protest over the violent dispersal by security forces of two Muslim Brotherhood sit-ins in Cairo that left hundreds dead. Protesters had been gathered at the two sit-ins for weeks in opposition to the army's move to oust Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July amid mass protests against him. According to Ateeq, ElBaradei had not presented to the government, the presidency or the revolutionary forces any other alternatives to dispersing the sit-ins, and had also disregarded the "terrorist crimes" he alleges were committed by the Muslim Brotherhood at the protest camps. Ateeq added that ElBaradei's resignation created an impression to the global community that the Egyptian government used excessive force in dispersing the sit-ins. In his resignation letter, ElBaradei said it has become hard for him to keep bearing responsibility for decisions that he did not approve of and that he had warned against, adding that he could not “be responsible before God for a single drop of blood." ElBaradei, a long-time diplomat and leading member of Egypt's secular political umbrella group the National Salvation Front supported Morsi's removal by the military in July amid mass protests.
