Cairo: Egyptian authorities will request Germany to hand over leading Al Jazeera journalist, Ahmad Mansour, who is detained in Berlin on criminal charges, state media said on Sunday.
Egypt’s chief prosecutor, Hesham Barakat, directed aides to request German authorities and the International Police (Interpol) to hand over Mansour, semi-official newspaper Al Ahram reported.
“He is put on the watchout lists in Egypt in view of the 15-year jail ruling against him,” Barakat told Al Ahram.
The 52-year-old TV anchor and reporter is wanted in Egypt after a court sentenced him in absentia to 15 years in prison on charges of complicity in the torture of a lawyer in the iconic Tahrir Square during the 2011 revolt against former president Hosny Mubarak.
Mansour and others, including a former Islamist minister, were convicted of kidnapping and physically and sexually assaulting the lawyer inside an office of a tourism company in Tahrir Square because they suspected him of being a collaborator with security agencies during the uprising that forced Mubarak out of power.
Mansour, who holds dual Egyptian-British citizenship, has dismissed the charges as fabricated.
Local media said that Egypt would soon send a file of charges against Mansour to back up its request for his extradition.
“In case Germany approves the request for his handover, a security team from Egypt will travel to escort him back to Egypt,” an unnamed security official told private newspaper Al Masry Al Youm.
Egyptian legal officials were quoted as saying that the charges against Mansour are criminal, not political.
A German judge was expected to decide on Mansour’s case on Monday.
Mansour, who was born in the Egyptian delta province of Dakahlia in 1962, is believed to be a member of the now-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
In 2013, the army deposed Islamist president Mohammad Mursi, a senior Brotherhood official, following massive street protests against his one-year rule.
Thousands of the Islamist group’s members and followers have since been rounded up and jailed on charges of inciting or participating in violence.
Egypt is also seeking the extradition of senior Brotherhood leaders living abroad after they were convicted in different cases of violence. They include Egyptian-born Qatari cleric Yousuf Al Qaradawi.
