Defiant Morsi tells court he is still legitimate head

Morsi, along with other 21 Islamist defendants, spent the session in a sound-proof glass cage that was set up to prevent a repeat of the interruptions they made in their first court appearance last year, Ahram Online reported.  

The rest of the defendants, including some 70 Palestinians, are on the run and being tried in absentia.  The ousted president told the court he had been flown to the trial location at 7 pm (local time) the previous night and insisted he is a political prisoner, not a detainee.  “I am the legitimate president of the country,” he told the court “and this trial is not legal.” The detainees chanted “Down with military rule.”

TV footage showed Morsi in white prison garb, nervously pacing back and forth in a cage in the courthouse, alongside other Islamist defendants who shouted “null, null” at the judges, whose legitimacy they refuse to acknowledge.  In a surprise move, he appointed Islamist thinker Mohamed Selim El-Awa as his defence lawyer, who shall represent him in this trial and all three other cases Morsi faces.  In a separate trial for inciting violence, Morsi has repeatedly refused to appoint a lawyer, saying he did not recognise the court's authority.

The trial came a day after powerful army chief Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who ousted Morsi, was backed by the army to run for presidency in the polls due by the end of April.