Russia Today News Network Reports Mubarak Could Be Dead
Hosni Mubarak During Trial
Russian news network Russia Today on Monday released as breaking news the information, documented by the Russian journalists from Egyptian sources, that former president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak suffered a heart attack and could be dead in prison.
The Russian network, which does not present the news as a certainty, says that it has information that on Sunday night Mubarak saw on television information about the fate of Muammar Qaddafi and that following this moment he suffered a massive heart stroke after seeing his friend and comrade dead and exposed to all to see.
Initial reports have said that he died instantaneously, then later reports said that he was only in critical condition and that he could pass away at any time. Russia Today says that the information cannot be easily verified and that Egyptian media said that he was not even in intensive care.
It is not the first time when news about former president’s health conditions indicate that he was dead. The first time such a thing occurred was soon after his ouster in February, before he was brought to justice.
President Hosni Mubarak was ousted at the end of 18 days of continuous protests in Cairo and the other major cities of Egypt. The protests ended four decades of his rule, and were followed by very serious demands that the president be brought to justice for what he had done.
There are reports that say that when he left the power to a supreme military council he had agreed with the military, from whose ranks he emerged as president, to release power in exchange for guarantees that he would not be humiliated nor prosecuted.
It would seem that the public pressure has compelled the military to admit to bringing him to justice in a process that was the highlight of the entire media, as the former “pharaoh” of Egypt appeared in a cage on a hospital stretcher, an image the Arab world had never seen before and some deemed as revolting and demeaning. The irony of the situation is that the procedures he underwent were created by himself.
After the first session of trial with Mubarak displayed in front of the cameras, the judge decided that the next sessions would be held without the press present. The argumentation was to avoid the exposing of the former president to insulting positions such as that from the cage.
The next sessions of the process went more difficultly as the witnesses changed their depositions or were held in contempt of the court for false under oath. They said mainly that they had not received order to use live ammunition against the protesters in the Tahrir Square.
The testimony that sent the trial into a stalemate was that of the head of the supreme military council General Tantawi, who said he wanted his deposition to come toward the end of the process, so that he may take the heat off the military.
Tantawi’s deposition was behind closed doors and had as a result the demand that the judges be refused and changed, a procedure that is sure to take a few months.
Mubarak is accused of ordering the troops that were defending him to use war ammunition and by that contributed to the killing of hundreds of Egyptians. If found guilty, he is expected to be executed by hanging.
Egypt is preparing to go through the first free elections in the last decades. The general elections are scheduled for November and are expected to bring to power a considerable Islamist influence.
