ICC rejects MB call to probe Egypt military crimes

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has rejected a bid by Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood to probe the military’s alleged crimes against humanity.

The court said it dismissed the bid because it was not presented on behalf of the concerned state.

“A communication seeking to accept the jurisdiction of the ICC over Egypt has been dismissed as not presented on behalf of the concerned State,” the ICC said in a press release issued on Thursday.

Egypt has not ratified the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the ICC. The court’s prosecutors said they can only investigate the country in response to a request from the United Nations Security Council or the Egyptian government.

The Brotherhood filed the complaint last December on behalf of the Freedom and Justice Party of the ousted president, Mohamed Morsi.

It demanded a probe into the murder, unlawful imprisonment and torture of protesters. It also included claims of targeted shootings and bulldozers running over the demonstrators.

On August 14 last year, at least 627 people were killed when riot police and military troops stormed Cairo’s Rabaa al-Adawiya Square to disperse the protest camps of Morsi’s supporters. It was the deadliest mass killing in Egypt’s recent history.

The developments come as more Brotherhood members have recently been given death sentences and lengthy jail terms.

Mohamed Badie, the senior leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, said the mass death sentences against him and other members of the group will result in the downfall of military-backed authorities.

On Tuesday, he described the verdict as “the last nail in the coffin of those who ousted the country’s first democratically-elected president, Morsi.”

Egypt has launched a heavy-handed crackdown against the supporters of Morsi following his ouster last July. Over 1,400 people have been killed and thousands have been sent to jail since then.