CAIRO - Two men, who were jointly convicted of raping and killing at least eight street children in Cairo and northern Egypt in 2006, were hanged to death at a central prison on Thursday, security sources said. "Ramadan Abdul Rahman Mansour, alias el-Turbini, and Farag Samir Mahmoud, known as Hanata, who had jointly raped and killed at least three and possibly up to eight street children, were hanged on Thursday," the sources quoting the prison's director, whose name was not given, said. Four years ago, police arrested el-Turbini and Hanata, who were leaders of a street gang of youngsters, for raping and killing eight children in the capital area and northern Egypt, the sources added. Police found three bodies, one in the Nile Delta town of Tanta, two in Alexandria and one in Shubra el-Kheima on the northern outskirts of Cairo, they said. El-Turbini and Hanata told police they had disposed of the bodies by throwing them off moving trains, stuffing them down drains or throwing them into the River Nile. The two convicted men told the court that they had started the killings in revenge for an attack of which they had been the victims when they were less than 10 years old. Cairo has tens of thousands of street children living on the margins of society, but reports are rare of them committing serious crimes of violence. The Tanta Criminal Court sentenced el-Turbini and Hanata to death a year later. Egypt applies the death sentence on persons convicted of committing capital crimes such as espionage, murder, rape, armed robbery, and drug trafficking. Local and international human rights groups have called for a moratorium on the death penalty in Egypt. They have urged the Government to establish a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty. But, Egypt rejected the call, reaffirming its sovereign right to develop its own legal systems.
