A decade after hundreds of Egyptians were killed in a single day when security forces dispersed a sit-in protest in Cairo, a new report released by a human rights group to coincide with the anniversary of the massacre has claimed that authorities debated but ultimately rejected potentially less lethal options to break up the demonstration.
Egypt witnessed one of its bloodiest days on August 14, 2013, when security forces used automatic weapons, armored personnel carriers and bulldozers to crush a sit-in demonstration in Cairo’s Rabaa Al-Adawya Square, where thousands of Egyptians had gathered for weeks to protest the military’s removal of democratically-elected President Mohamed Morsy. Official accounts put the death toll at around 600 people, including several members of the security forces.
, is that it includes “transcripts of witness testimonies” that show how officials decided to disperse the protest. “This is the first time that we have official evidence… that the ministry considered two options in detail, and the reason for why they were dismissed or abandoned before the operation,” Bahgat told CNN.
. “The government has opted for the first option, as the leaders in the sit-in had gone beyond that which is fathomable or appropriate,” the report added. According to report also contradict the 2014 summary, which said that the sit-in was “not peaceful neither before nor during the dispersal,” even if “it started as such.” “The larger number of Rabaa victims were innocent civilians who were most likely peaceful demonstrators,” the
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