Egyptian Set To Go On Trial On Charges Of Spying For Israel
CAIRO (News Agencies) - The trial of an Egyptian accused of spying for Israel in league with a Russian national who allegedly recruited him was due to open Saturday in a Cairo state security court.
Sherif Fawzi al-Filali, a 34-year-old engineer under detention since September when he was arrested at his Cairo home, faces up to 25 years in prison with forced labor if found guilty of the spying charges.
The former Russian officer accused of recruiting him is being tried in absentia in the same case at the high state security court that tries breaches of Egypt's long-standing emergency laws.
They will have no right to appeal their sentences through the courts.
The pair is accused of being paid by the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad to supply information on the political, economic and military situation in Egypt, and harming the nation's interests, according to the charge sheet.
Mirfat Shalabi, a lawyer friend of the family, is defending Filali after the rest of Egypt's lawyers refused to go near the case and a top Muslim cleric denounced anyone who dared to defend him.
Egypt's Grand Mufti Sheikh Nasr Farid Wassel, appointed by President Hosni Mubarak to issue religious decrees, had told a newspaper that defending any national traitor or spy was "totally illicit" in the eyes of Islam.
The mufti's office said Friday that Sheikh Nasr was expressing a personal opinion and not issuing a religious decree, or fatwa.
The best-known political pundits in Egypt's press had criticized the mufti for flouting the right to defense under both Egyptian and Islamic law.
Sources close to the prosecution have said Filali admitted during interrogation that he had been asked to gather intelligence on the Egyptian army's weapons, tourism in Egypt and a giant irrigation project in the south.
Israel has denied any involvement in the case and a spokesperson for the Israeli embassy in Cairo said Friday that the mission had no reason to send a delegate to observe the trial.
Relations between Egypt and Israel have cooled during the current wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence, with Egypt recalling its ambassador from Tel Aviv to protest Israel's "excessive use of force."
Egypt, in 1979, became the first Arab country to sign a peace treaty with the Jewish state, but that peace has passed through frequent frosty patches.
