Egypt detains at least 50 in Muslim group (AP) Updated: 2005-11-26 09:37
Police detained at least 50 members of Egypt's largest Islamic movement, the
Muslim Brotherhood, Friday on the eve of run-off elections to parliament,
officials said.
The detentions took place in five provinces. A senior Brotherhood official,
Ali Abdel Fattah, said the detainees had been playing an active role in the
outlawed group's election campaign.
"The police are back to their old habits of cracking down on the
Brotherhood," Fattah said.
The group's media coordinator, Abdel Moneim Mohammed, said the police had
detained 58 members.
Police confirmed the arrest of about 50 Brotherhood members in various
provinces.
The Interior Ministry said in a statement that detainees had planned to
deploy "thugs" at polling stations to disturb Saturday's elections.
The elections are taking place in nine provinces where no candidate got more
than half the vote in the second round of the legislative polls on Nov. 20.
Forty-one of the candidates standing Saturday are members of the Brotherhood.
As it is banned, the group cannot run as a party, but it endorses nominally
independent candidates whose allegiance to the Brotherhood is known to the
voters.
Brotherhood officials have said almost 500 of the group's activists have been
arrested since three-stage parliamentary elections began on Nov. 9. So far most
have been released.
The Brotherhood's surprising success in the polls — it has already won 47
seats, more than tripling its total in the outgoing parliament — has increased
tensions with the ruling party headed by President Hosni Mubarak, which has long
dominated the 454-seat parliament.
The third and final round of the elections is scheduled for Dec.
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