Egypt, North Africa | featured news

Egypt’s dissolved parliament defied a court order and reconvened Tuesday, escalating the power struggle between the newly elected Islamist president and the military over the political future of a nation still tangled in the legacy of toppled leader Hosni Mubarak.

Mohamed Morsi was formally sworn in on Saturday as Egypt’s first democratically elected president, marking a new stage in an ever murkier struggle to define the future of the nation.

The chairman of the election commission announced that Mohamed Morsi had won 51 percent of the runoff vote completed last weekend, an ambiguous marker in Egypt’s promised transition to democracy.

Egypt entered its final day of voting on Sunday with very few people going to the polls to choose Hosni Mubarak’s successor under a cloud of apprehension and anticipation. Turnout appeared dismal in a sign of just how polarizing and demoralizing the choice between a military strongman and conservative Islamist is for the Arab World’s most populous nation.

Doctors used a defibrillator twice on Hosni Mubarak Monday when they could not find a pulse, the latest health crisis for the ousted Egyptian president since he was sentenced to life and moved to a prison hospital nine days ago, security officials said.

Hosni Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison Saturday for failing to stop the killing of protesters during the uprising that forced him from power last year.

Egypt’s election commission rejected fraud complaints and confirmed on Monday that a conservative Islamist from the Muslim Brotherhood and a secular former military officer will compete in next month’s presidential runoff.

A prosecutor in the trial of Hosni Mubarak demanded on Thursday that the ousted Egyptian leader be sentenced to hang on charges of complicity in the killing of protesters.

An Egyptian civilian court ordered the army on Tuesday to end forced virginity tests on female detainees in military prisons.

The housewives and breadwinners stepping out of a Cairo supermarket with bags of groceries agreed on one thing. “The prices are very high,” said Sabah Fehmi, 58. “The economy has been very bad after the revolution.”