Egypt\'s military ruler summoned in Mubarak trial

Judge Ahmed Refaat said that Tantawi and other top officials, some of them still serving, would give their evidence behind closed doors for reasons of "national security."

He said Tantawi would testify on Sunday followed by the chief of the general staff, Sami Anan, on Monday and former intelligence chief and vice president General Omar Suleiman on Tuesday.

Interior Minister Mansur al-Essawi and a predecessor, Mahmud Wagdi, will give evidence on September 14 and 15 respectively, he added.

Journalists will not be allowed in the courtroom, said the judge, who also imposed a gag order on the star witnesses\' testimony.

The latest hearing was the fourth in the trial which opened on August 3 and, unlike the first two sessions, the proceedings were again not televised.

At the previous court session on Monday, none of the police witnesses who gave evidence implicated Mubarak or his interior minister Habib al-Adly in the deaths during the popular uprising that forced the strongman to step down in February after 30 years of autocratic rule.

Prosecutors, under fire for summoning police witnesses who appeared to back up the defence\'s case, on Wednesday accused a police witness of having revised his testimony to favour the defendants, following accusations in the Egyptian media of a cover-up over the killings of hundreds of anti-regime protesters.

The prosecution said Captain Mohammed Abdel Hakim had given them different testimony during its investigation.

But Judge Ahmed Refaat, who initially ordered Hakim detained following the prosecution\'s accusation, exonerated him at the end of the session.

Mohamed el-Damati, a representative of the families\' lawyers in civil cases, filed to question Tantawi, to whom Mubarak handed power on his ouster in February, as well as the fallen leader\'s wife Suzanne.

Tantawi was defence minister for two decades under the veteran president.

The lawyers said they also wanted to question former intelligence chief Suleiman who is reported to have said Mubarak was aware of each bullet fired during the revolution.

The case against the ousted president, Adly and six of his security chiefs suffered a blow on Monday when it emerged that the prosecution\'s main witness had been convicted of destroying a recording of police telephone calls.

And two other police officers summoned to back the case that Mubarak and the other accused had ordered the shootings of protesters testified they had in fact been ordered to exercise "restraint."

Essam al-Batawi, Adly\'s lawyer, told AFP after Wednesday\'s session that prosecution witnesses\' testimony favoured his defendant.

"The prosecution\'s witnesses have turned out to be defence witnesses," he said. "Their testimony confirms what the defendants have said, that they did not issue instructions to use ammunition against protesters."

But lawyers for the victims\' families accused police of leaning on the witnesses.

"The witnesses were subject to pressure to change their testimony," said Sameh Ashur, the head lawyer for the victims.

Television footage showed the ailing 83-year-old Mubarak, who faces charges of involvement in the killings and corruption, arriving at the courtroom in an ambulance and on a stretcher on Wednesday, as for previous hearings.

There were no reports of trouble between his supporters and opponents outside the court, unlike on Monday when police arrested 20 people.

But late on Tuesday, football fans clashed with police in a Cairo stadium, injuring nearly 80 people, after they chanted slogans against Mubarak and torched dozens of cars.

The charges against Mubarak, who has pleaded not guilty, follow months of protests demanding justice for the roughly 850 people killed during the revolt which ended his regime.

The trial, adjourned until Thursday, is being held in a police academy once named after Mubarak on Cairo\'s outskirts.

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