Egypt vows for stricter laws after prosecutor's death
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the Egyptian President guranteed tougher laws against terrorists while speaking at the funeral of prosecutor Hisham Barakat, who was assassinated in a Cairo car bombing. The President said that the government's hands were tied because of the law and that he would ascertain that this changes. He called for the change in laws to punish those behind the assasination.
On 29 June 2015, Egypt's state prosecutor Hisham Barakat was assassinated by a bomb blast in the capital Cairo. The prosecutor succumbed to "ruptures in the lung and stomach, and internal bleeding". Zakaria Abd El-Aziz Osman has been delegated as the interim prosecutor-general in lieu of Barakat. 2 civilians and 2 policemen were also injured in the deadly attack.
Hisham Barakat had been appointed the Prosecutor-General in July 2013, by Egypt's then interim President Adly Mansour. His appointment came after the military coup against the country's first freely elected president, Morsi.
The blast came after the ISIS called for strikes on the judiciary after 6 militants were prosecuted. Barakat himself had adjudged thousands of Islamists to trial since 2013, with hundreds of them then sentenced to death. He was the most senior government official killed since Morsi's overthrow in 2013 and his death came as a serious blow to President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi's regime.
Hours after the Egyptian prosecutor was killed, the Islamic State issued a video which showed militants executing 3 high profile judges in Egypt. The assassination of the judges in al-Arish happened in May 2015 shortly after Mohammed Morsi was sentenced to death for being involved in a mass jail breakout in 2011. The ISIS had titled the brutal video "the liquidation of judges".
The US embassy in Cairo strongly condemned the assassination of Egypt's Hisham Barakat calling it a "heinous terrorist attack". The US pledged to stand with Egypt in its fight against terrorism. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon too criticised the fatal terrorist attack offering his condolences to the judge's family. He said that those responsible for the blast should be "brought to justice".
Celebrations for the 2nd anniversary of President Morsi's ousting have been cancelled in Egypt because of the death of Prosecutor-General Hisham Barakat. President Sissi in a meeting with the Interior Minister Magdy Abdel-Ghaffar after the assassination, asked the government to strengthen security and find the militants responsible. Barakat will be given a military funeral on 30 June.
