CAIRO: A top Muslim Brotherhood official and Vice-President of its political party the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) has gone on trial for defaming a female presenter. FJP VP Essam al-Erian and Jihan Mansur were both present on Saturday during the opening of the trial, the al-Youm al-Saba'a newspaper reported. Mansur, a presenter with private television channel, Dream, complained that Erian whom she had interviewed had hinted she was paid to criticize the Muslim Brotherhood. The case highlights the ongoing tense climate prevailing between Islamists and the Egyptian media since the election in June of President Mohamed Mursi, who rose from the ranks of the Brotherhood. It also came as violence between the Brotherhood and anti-Mohamed Morsi supporters has broken out across the country over the past few days. Islamists have been repeatedly accused of pressuring the media through the suspension of journalists accused of “insulting” Mursi or airing information seen to be inaccurate. The appointment of Muslim Brotherhood member Salah Abdel Maqsud Metwalli as information minister and a summer revamp of state-run media personnel has fuelled perceptions that the group intended to put pressure on the media. In August, Mursi tried the pacify the media by signing a decree scrapping preventive detention of journalists for alleged media crimes. This led to the freeing of Islam Afifi, editor of small independent newspaper al-Dustur, who was accused of spreading false news and inciting disorder. Afifi was the first journalist to go on trial since the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in February last year.