Alaa Abdel Fattah and 24 others were sentenced to 15 years in absentia by the Cairo Criminal Court on Wednesday morning. Lawyer Mahmoud Belal said the verdict was abrupt and the defendants were not called into court in time for the issuance of the verdict. He said two of the defendants, Abdel Fattah and Mohamed Nouby, were arrested in an implementation of the verdict. They were arrested following a protest held on 26 November in objection to the military trials of civilians, a protest held two days after controversial Protest Law was passed. They were accused of violating the highly controversial Protest Law, "thuggery", acquiring weapons during a protest, illegal assembly, blocking roads and attacking a police officer and stealing his radio. The Protest Law was issued by former president Adly Mansour on 24 November 2013 to regulate the right to peaceful assembly. It has garnered wide criticism from domestic as well as international human rights organisations since then. Several political movements have also criticised the law. All defendants were arrested on that day, except for Abdel Fattah who was arrested from his home on 28 November, despite announcing his intention to hand himself in. They were all released on bail in separate groups. Abdel Fattah had been legally prosecuted during the former regimes of Morsi, for allegedly inciting violence against Muslim Brotherhood members, and former president Hosni Mubarak. He was also detained for two months in 2011 under the rule of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF). Charges he faced then were for allegedly assaulting soldiers during the attacks carried out by army forces against a predominantly Coptic protest outside the Maspero building in October 2011.
