CAIRO: An Egyptian court ratified on Sunday the death sentence against a man convicted of killing six Christians outside a church but acquitted two alleged accomplices, the official MENA news agency reported. The State Security emergency court had referred Mohammed Ahmad Hussein to the country's top government cleric last month, a legal formality before the court can announce a death sentence. It delayed its verdict on the two other defendants until Sunday's hearing. Hussein will be hanged for the murder of six Copts and a Muslim policeman in the southern town of Nagaa Hammadi after the Coptic Christmas Eve Mass in January 2010. The court acquitted Qorshi Abul Haggag Muhammed and Hindawi Muhammed Sayyid, whom police arrested with Hussein several days after the massacre. Before an Alexandria church bombing early this year killed 21 people, the Nagaa Hammadi attack had been the deadliest of its kind since 2000 when 20 Copts were killed in sectarian clashes. Copts make up about 10 percent of Egypt's 80-million population.
