Egypt Court confirms mass death sentences

An Egyptian court has confirmed death sentences against 183 men convicted of killing 13 policemen, in a verdict slammed as 'outrageous' by rights group Amnesty International.

The verdict came as another court announced that deposed Islamist president Mohamed Morsi would stand trial on February 15 in an espionage case.

The policemen were killed in an attack on a police station in Kerdasa, a town on the outskirts of Cairo, on August 14, 2013.

The attack took place on the same day that security forces killed hundreds of demonstrators in clashes as they dismantled two massive protest camps in Cairo supporting Morsi.

The court had in December issued a preliminary verdict against 188 defendants in a mass trial, of whom two were acquitted on Monday while one, a minor, was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Charges against the remaining two were dropped after the court found that they were dead.

Monday's verdict, which can be appealed, came after the initial sentences were sent to the grand mufti, the government's official interpreter of Islamic law, for ratification.

Since the army deposed Morsi on July 3, 2013, at least 1400 people have been killed in a police crackdown on protests, mostly Islamists supporting the ousted leader.

Hundreds of his supporters have been sentenced to death in swift mass trials which the United Nations says were 'unprecedented in recent history'.

In a statement after Monday's verdict Amnesty International said the court's decision was 'outrageous' and 'an example of the bias of the Egyptian criminal justice system'.

'Issuing mass death sentences whenever the case involves the killing of police officers now appears to be near-routine policy, regardless of facts and with no attempt to establish individual responsibility,' said Amnesty's Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui.

Rights groups and critics of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the former army chief who ousted Morsi, say authorities are using the judiciary as an arm to repress any form of dissent, including from secular activists.

Morsi and several top leaders of his black-listed Muslim Brotherhood are in custody and facing several trials on charges punishable by death.

Egypt's first freely elected president is already facing three trials and the fourth will open on February 15 for allegedly leaking 'classified documents' to Qatar and the Doha-based Al-Jazeera network.