GUILTY!!!!

Just shown live on AlJazeera:

Hosni Mubarak, former Egyptian dictator, found guilty of all crimes, sentenced to life imprisonment.

Oh, yes!!!!!! LL

ETA: Interior Minister also sentenced to life. Charges against Mubarak's 2 sons dropped.

It would appear these sentences are not for complicity in the ordering of the killings etc in Tahir Square but for not stopping the slaughter.

YES!!

Rose wrote:YES!!

Morning Rose! Looks like all hell is breaking loose in Cairo! The sons are still in jail as they have another trial due, this time for insider trading. Mubarak was acquitted for corruption which is quite incredible as he has milked Egypt of all its wealth while he was in power. Riot in courtroom after verdict handed down. Cheering outside, but commentators are expecting a large gathering in Tahir Square as it seems the people are not happy with the acquittal verdicts. Now they are discussing where Mubarak should serve out his sentence - at present he is is the comfortable military hospital, all mod cons it seems. LL

I have rather lost track of what went on I'm afraid. But at least he has been sentenced to Life in Prison.
Now the big worry is Syria.

Oh my, that was quick - I thought it would drag on for years. Good!

I am not sure about Syria, Sabot, I am none too keen on ANYONE killing women and children, as the 'rebel fighters' were threatening to do to their rivals in revenge.

Sadly, that is what it usually degenerates into, Bonny. At the moment I am hard pushed to work out who is killing who.
Tribal Loyalties run deep, which most Brits really don't understand, since our Tribes have disappeared into the mists of time. But it is basically what the Gang Culture in Urban Britain is all about. They don't have half decent families so they form their own Tribes, while Social Workers flap their hands and feel sorry for them because they have just been forced into knifing someone from another Patch.
The only answer that I can see at the moment is to leave Britain. The best decision that I have ever made. It was bad twenty years ago. Now it is diabolical.

I am afraid Syria has gone down a far different route to the Arab Spring countries; ho help from anyone for those trying to unseat Assad, and with Russia and China openly supporting him and his despicable, murderous regime, means the country has now descended into a civil war. We can expect tit-for-tat reprisals, rape, and wholesale slaughter. It will be a bloodbath first and a democracy later, much, much later. I see no end to all this, unless someone can wipe out Assad, his family and their supporters. LL

I don't want to think about that, LL. But I think you might be right. Personally, I do not approve of interfering in other Countries. But neither do I approve of harbouring the deposed Despots.

To me, there is a case for UN soldiers going into Syria to try to stop massacres, whoever is doing them, but I don't think it ticks the boxes for other intervention the way Libya did.

It's going to end very, very badly, and as usual, it will be innocents who suffer most.

After all, the warring factions could always lay down their arms and say, No, we are not going to kill our fellow-Muslims and Syrian citizens.

Returning to the Egypt verdicts, it seems 6 senior security/police officials were also acquitted. A new wrinkle is the upcoming Presidential election; the last PM under Mubarak, Ahmed Shafir, is up against the Muslim Brotherhood nominee; people are beginning to wonder whether, if the ex-PM wins Mubarak may well be given a Presidential Pardon - he was a close friend of Shafir.

Mubarak may just have suffered a heart attack!!!!

More news from Egypt:

Tahir Square in Cairo is now full of protesters, as is the main square in Alexandria. people are angry at the sentences and the Muslim Brotherhood is calling for more protests. A commentator on CNN, herself Egyptian, said that the anger is not just that Mubarak and his interior minister will live, though in prison, it is that all the known perpetrators of the actions the regime took against the protesters have walked free (not the sons as they are facing trial over corruption). She also pointed out that the trial was before a civilian court,the judges were all appointed by the Mubarak regime before his fall and therefore the public see the whole thing as politically rigged; also that despite everything the revolution appeared to achieved, there are many Mubarak regime members still in power. It looks as if the protests will grown and things may well get out of hand. And let us not forget that the military are still in power. LL

This sounds a bit like The Glorious Revolution in Portugal.