Egyptian police and Muslim Brotherhood (MB) sources said on Sunday that security forces had arrested ten MB members in the Dakahlia governorate, some 160 kilometers north of Cairo.
According to a security official, the men were arrested on charges of "promoting the principles of a banned group, disturbing public security and possessing fliers containing ideas that could endanger social harmony and security."
MB sources said its members had been arrested in a series of raids early Sunday morning.
Analysts believe the spate of arrests aims to hider the MB’s performance in next month's parliamentary elections and preempt a repeat of the Islamist group’s unprecedented successes in 2005 elections. In those races, the brotherhood, which fields its electoral candidates as nominal independents, managed to capture 88 seats–roughly one fifth–of the national assembly.
On Saturday, the group announced plans to vie for a full one third of the seats in parliament.
Leaders of the ruling National Democratic Party of President Hosni Mubarak, for their part, recently issued statements that the MB would fail to secure the same number of seats that it won in previous elections.
Interior Minister Habib Al-Adli warned the MB earlier this month against the use of the group's traditional slogan, "Islam is the solution," in parliamentary campaigning.
Despite the warning, however, brotherhood spokesman Essam al-Aryan, at a Saturday press conference, said the group nevertheless planned to use the slogan in upcoming campaigns.
In 2008, Egypt's parliament approved a legal amendment prohibiting the use of religiously-themed slogans during general elections in a move seen by many as having specifically targeted the Muslim Brotherhood.
