Sisi admits ordering filming of 2013 protests which led to coup against Morsi

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has admitted that he ordered the Egyptian air force to film 2013 protests against his late predecessor, Mohammed Morsi, which were used to justify a military coup led by Sisi.

The now-president, a former army general who was appointed defence minister by Morsi in 2012, said in a press conference on Monday that he was responsible for ordering military planes to film video of the protests.

“I was monitoring this and I [ordered] planes to fly over and film all the squares in Egypt, not just in Cairo and Alexandria, everywhere,” the Egyptian president said.

Mohammed Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, won Egypt’s first ever democratic presidential election in 2012.

However, he faced opposition from Egypt’s media, establishment, and secular political forces throughout his brief time in office.

Protests were organised against his rule on 30 June 2013 and the military used these to justify his removal in a coup on 3 July of that year, almost exactly one year after he assumed office.

Video of the protests released by the Egyptian military appeared to show huge crowds in Cairo’s Tahrir Square protesting against Morsi.

Supporters of Sisi’s coup claimed at the time that 20 to 30 million people had taken to the streets to call for the democratically elected leader’s removal, but independent fact-checkers said at the time that this was a gross exaggeration with no more than one million people protesting against Morsi.

Following the coup, tens of thousands of coup opponents were imprisoned with hundreds more being massacred at Rabaa Square in Cairo. Morsi himself died in an Egyptian courtroom in 2019 after years of medical neglect in prison.

Human rights organisations continue to criticise Sisi’s government for its suppression of rights and freedoms and imprisonment and torture of political opponents.