Egypt's Cassation Court overturned on Tuesday the death sentences handed down to former president Mohamed Mursi and other Muslim Brotherhood figures in the Wadi Natroun prison break case, and ordered a retrial.
In June 2015, a Cairo criminal court sentenced Mursi and five other Brotherhood members including Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie and Saad al-Katatni, to death over charges of murder and attempted murder of policemen, torching government buildings, and escaping prison, in January 2011.
The prosecution had also charged the defendants of conspiring with the Palestinian movement Hamas, the Lebanese Hezbollah and other foreign elements to "cause chaos…and break into Egyptian prisons."
The Cassation Court accepted the appeals presented by the defence team and ordered a retrial in another criminal court circuit.
The former president came to power in June 2012, only to be deposed by the military following mass protests against his rule a year later.
Since Mursi's ouster, hundreds of Brotherhood members and supporters have been arrested and convicted in court.
Mursi has been charged in several other cases including espionage and insulting the judiciary. An Egyptian court upheld his 20-year prison sentence in October in the case dubbed as the presidential palace clashes.
Egypt listed the Brotherhood as a terrorist organisation in December 2013 and insists it is behind the wave of militancy which has targeted security personnel since Mursi's ouster. The Brotherhood continuously denies the accusations.
