Jakarta (Antara) - The Association of Indonesian Moslem Scholars (ICMI) has appealed to the Egyptian government to cancel the death penalty given to 683 members and supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood. "I appeal to the Egyptian government to cancel the mass death penalty because it is against justice and human rights," Chairman of ICMI's presidium, Prof. Nanat Fatah, stated here on Thursday. On Monday (April 28), the El-Minya district court in Egypt conferred death sentence to the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Muhammad Badie, and 682 other members and sympathizers of the organization for supporting the toppled president, Mohammed Morsi. In March, the same sentence was also awarded to 529 other Brotherhood members, but the sentence of 492 of them was later demoted to life imprisonment. Several officials in the country had also protested the sentence, including Indonesia's Foreign Minister, Marty Natalegawa. "As a friendly country with the largest Muslim population in the world, Indonesia is closely following the developments in Egypt with concern," he reiterated. He remarked that Indonesia as a country has also undergone a transitional process towards democracy and is aware of the complex and complicated situation in Egypt. Indonesia, however, is convinced and optimistic that the Egyptian government can ably overcome it based on the interests and aspirations of the Egyptian people, he affirmed. "Without intending to interfere in the Egyptian domestic affairs, we are concerned about the news regarding the death sentence meted out to 683 people on April 28, 2014 and 529 people in March 2014. This has drawn significant attention of the Indonesian people," he reiterated. (*) Reporting by Dewanto Samodro

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