Hosni Mubarak
© Reuters / Amr Abdallah DalshFormer Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak waves to his supporters from his stretcher as he returns to Maadi military hospital in Cairo November 29, 2014
An Egyptian court has found former president Hosni Mubarak not guilty of conspiring to kill hundreds of protesters during the 2011 uprising, which led to his ouster. He was further exonerated on separate corruption charges.

Addressing journalists in attendance, chief judge Mahmud Kamel al-Rashidi warned the media they should reserve judgment until they had read the massive 1,430 verdict in its entirety.

The former leader had been charged along with seven of his former police commanders for the death of 239 protesters - a fraction of the 850 people activists believe died in the unrest. Judge al-Rashidi said the charges had been politically motivated and did not deserve to be tried in his court. Mubarak's interior minister Habib el-Adly and six aides were also found not guilty of conspiracy to commit murder.

The court further found that neither Mubarak, his aides, nor his two sons, Gamal and Alaa, were guilty of corruption charges stemming from a controversial gas deal with Israel. Hussein Salem, a businessman and longtime confident of Mubarak, was similarly found not guilty after being tried in absentia.

The sweeping exoneration was met with cheers in the packed courtroom.


Despite the verdict, Mubarak will not be released from prison immediately, as he is serving a 3-year sentence for embezzling public funds. Following the reading of the verdict, Mubarak said he had done "nothing wrong," AFP reports.

Mubarak was initially sentenced to life imprisonment for the deaths in 2012, along with former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly. That sentence was later overturned by an appeals court on a technicality.

Upwards of 5,000 police officers had been deployed to provide security at the courthouse, though passions have waned since he was first deposed nearly 4 years ago. Anticipating any potential outbursts in the courtroom, prior to reading the verdict, the judge warned that anyone who disrupted the court could face a year in prison.

Saturday's verdict had initially been slated for September 27, but Judge al-Rashidi postponed it, saying he had not had ample time to write out his reasoning in light of the thousands of case filed presented during the retrial.

Meanwhile, Mubarak's Islamist successor Mohammad Morsi, who was himself toppled by Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in July 2013, has been put on trial for incitement to commit murder and violence. Ironically, perhaps, many of those charges stem from the anti-Mubarak uprising, as well as the army-led coup that drove him from power.

He is also facing espionage charges.

Following a massive crackdown against Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood, nearly 1,000 were killed and thousands more were arrested. Several secular and liberal youth activists have also been imprisoned for staging unauthorized protests following Morsi's ouster.

Saturday's verdict will further fuel fears that Mubarak-era rulers are regaining lost ground.

RT contributor Bel Trew said despite the muted response, a public response was likely to come once Mubarak is actually released from jail.

"Seeing Hosni Mubark, who was toppled after nationwide protests, walking free in the streets of Cairo or in his villa in Sharm el-Sheikh, is going to greatly upset people. So I expect there to be further protests," she said.


Al-Sisi has made jump starting Egypt's flagging economy a top priority after years of unrest. Critics say he has largely ignored the desire for democratic freedoms, which brought Mubarak down after ruling the country for three-decades. He is further attempting to mend relations with foreign and regional powers who didn't support the manner in which Morsi, the democratically elected president, was driven from power.

Via Agence France-Presse