Egypt orders probe into alleged vote violations

“This is the first time in the history of Egypt that judges are assigned to investigate vote violations,” a ministry spokesman said in a presser.

Many top Brotherhood officials consistently have characterized their critics as holdovers from the era of deposed President Hosni Mubarak. Most top judges are Mubarak-era appointees, but the National Salvation Front is largely made of the Mubarak-era opposition, and Mr. Morsi’s critics also include some Islamists.

On Monday, Egypt’s Supreme Constitutional Court — the country’s most prestigious tribunal, which is at the center of the Brotherhood’s conflict with the judiciary — denounced a statement by a Morsi aide in which it discussed the court under a “campaign” by “anti-revolutionary forces” to “overturn the gains of the revolution” against Mubarak.

Court spokesman Maher Sami accused Essam el-Haddad of “tarnishing” the court’s image and criticized him for writing the memo in English.

“The Supreme Constitutional Court is asking why the president’s aide chose to address the foreign media,” he said. He added that Mr. el-Haddad aimed at “toppling the court’s reputation internationally” and that the “crime of spreading false and provocative news is punishable by law.” Mr. el-Haddad denied the court’s accusations and described them as “baseless.

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