Egypt's chief prosecutor, Hisham Barakat, died on Monday from injuries inflicted in a Cairo bomb attack, the first assassination of a senior state official since the July 2013 ousting of then president Mohamed Morsi, a Muslim Brotherhood stalwart.
The attack was timed to coincide with the first anniversary of the proclamation of the caliphate in Syria and Iraq under Islamic State (IS) commander Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and the the second anniversary of the June 30th, 2013, mass protests in Egypt that toppled Mr Morsi.
Mr Barakat, 65, died from internal bleeding in his lungs and stomach at Nozha hospital in the capital’s upscale Heliopolis suburb. Two drivers, a civilian and five security men were also injured when a remotely-controlled bomb in a parked car exploded as his convoy passed the military academy.
The prosecutor, sworn-in during the post-Morsi interim regime, had adopted a hard line against Brotherhood members and supporters who protested Mr Morsi’s removal or took part in violent attacks against civilians, troops, police, and public facilities.
Thousands have been arrested and put on trial; scores, including Mr Morsi and other senior Brotherhood figures, have been sentenced to death.
Murder of judges
Human rights organisations have accused the judiciary of staging political trials of government opponents, whether Brotherhood-connected or secular activists.
Early this year Mr Barakat’s offices near the high court in central Cairo were struck by a bomb that killed two people. Following the murder in early May of three judges in al-Arish in restive northern Sinai, Islamic State’s (IS) affiliate in Egypt called for the assassination of judges. Last Sunday, a video was published, entitled “Eliminating judges”. It showed gunmen firing at a vehicle said to be transporting judges.
During an emergency meeting with Interior Minister Magdy Abdel-Ghaffar, Egyptian president Abdel-Fattah al- Sisi, a former chief of military staff, called for tightened security measures and demanded the arrest of the perpetrators of the attack.
However, it will be difficult for the authorities to crack down harder than they already have on the Brotherhood, its supporters, and IS, formerly Ansar Beit al- Maqdis, which is largely based in northern Sinai. It has declared the area a province of the “Islamic state”.
Hundreds of IS supporters have been slain this year in a army campaign to end the Sinai insurgency which intensified after the topping of Mr Morsi whose government was accused of allowing foreign fighters and weapons to enter the country.
