Qasr al-Nil misdemeanor court on Saturday imprisoned 19 defendants for two years each on charges of protesting without a permit on November 11 of the past year.
A social media campaign called “Haraket Ghalaba” (poor people's movement) has emerged in September calling on Egyptian citizens to flock to the streets on November 11 for mass protests against rising prices and Egypt's deteriorating economic situation, and it called the move "The Revolution of the Poor".
Egypt imposed a big security clampdown in all the cities that day and mass demonstrations failed to take place.
The Interior Ministry has arrested several members affiliated with the banned Muslim Brotherhood group, accusing them of inciting people to destabilize the country.
The suspects are accused of printing leaflets that incited protests over sharp increases in the cost of living and general economic mismanagement on the part of the government. The suspects are alleged to have planned acts of violence during the protests.
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has urged Egyptians not to protest and warned that there would be no going back on economic reforms, no matter how much pain they might cause.
