Egypt Morsi Critic Ahmed Douma Detained
A prominent opponent of Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi has been detained on suspicion of insulting the Islamist leader, the activist's lawyer said on Wednesday.
Ahmed Douma, a blogger and activist who has called for Morsi's trial over the shooting deaths of protesters, was ordered held for four days by prosecutors in the Nile Delta city of Tanta, lawyer Ali Soliman told Agence France Presse.
The prosecutors were investigating a complaint accusing Douma of insulting Morsi, filed by a member of Morsi's Freedom and Justice Party, Soliman said. He said Douma turned himself in on Tuesday.
Morsi, elected last June, has been accused of cracking down on opposition and critical journalists.
The presidency says it has withdrawn several complaints it filed against journalists accused of fabricating reports about Morsi, but most complaints were brought by private citizens.
The state prosecutor last month opened a new investigation into television satirist Bassem Youssef on suspicion of "threatening public security."
Youssef, who regularly skewers the country's ruling Islamists on his wildly popular show, was released on $2,200 bail after an interrogation that lasted nearly five hours.
Since taking office, Morsi has faced waves of sometimes deadly unrest led by a loose coalition of secular leaning parties and youth protest movements that helped oust president Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
Several dozen people have died in clashes with police or in street fighting between Morsi's Islamist loyalists and the opposition.
The Muslim Brotherhood, on whose ticket Morsi ran in the election, had filed a complaint against Douma among other activists, accusing him of inciting violent clashes outside its headquarters in March.
Source: Agence France Presse
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