CRI听力:Egyptian Court Sentences 183 Brotherhood Supporters to Death

An Egyptian court has sentenced 183 Muslim Brotherhood supporters to death for their involvement in the death of 16 police officers amid the violence surrounding the unrest which led to the ouster of former President Muhammad Morsi in August of 2013.

They are among 188 who received preliminary death sentences late last year.

The Muslim Brotherhood supporters have been convicted of being behind the ransacking of a police station in a village near Cairo.

Sixteen police officers, including a local police chief, were killed.

The violence came after security forces killed hundreds of people when they cleared protest camps set up in the capital by supporters of Morsi.

Egyptian political commentator Abdallah El-Sennawy says the courts are issuing a warning.

"It is very important to put into consideration that what happened in the village of Kerdassah needed a court ruling as a deterrent, as what happened there was unacceptable to the whole world, the storming of its police station and the killing of all the police officers and soldiers and mutilating some of the bodies."

Thousands of Muslim brotherhood supporters have been arrested since the ouster of Morsi.

The Muslim Brotherhood has since been labeled a terrorist organization.