Egypt executes first anti-coup prisoner

Egyptian authorities have hanged a man convicted of participating in violence in the aftermath of the coup against former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi in July 2013.

Mahmoud Ramadan Abdel-Nabi is the first of the hundreds of people sentenced to death in the wake of the coup to have his sentence carried out, having had his final appeal against his sentence rejected in February.

A court sentenced him to death in 2014 after he was found guilty of throwing people off a roof, and killing one person, during clashes in Egypt's second city of Alexandria. He was among dozens of people convicted over the clashes.

The violence came as supporters and opponents of the elected president, Morsi, held rival demonstrations across the city, and a video recording emerged of people being thrown off a roof.

Abdel-Nabi was hanged at 7am local time at Alexandria's Borg al-Arab prison. The execution was condemned by rights groups.

The African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights had requested that incumbent Egyptian president Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi stop the execution in the wake of a complaint filed by human rights lawyer Ahmed Mufrih.

The complaint stated that defendants had been tortured, and that the trial lacked due process. A request for the defendants to be questioned again was not responded to.

Leen Muhammed, Abdel-Nabi's wife, said her husband was "a victim of the Egyptian judiciary".

Morsi is himself facing multiple trials on charges that carry the death penalty, and the head of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood movement, Mohamed Badie, already has one death sentence against his name.