Three Egyptian Christian students accused of “offending Islam” were sentenced today (25 Feb.) to five years each, Coptic news site Watani said.
Muller Atef, Albert Ashraf and Bassem Amgad were given jail terms, while a fourth, Clinton Maged, is due to be remanded in a juvenile facility for five years, according to the ruling by a court in Minya (265km south of Cairo).
The regional court had earlier sentenced their Coptic Christian teacher, Gad Younan, to three years in prison. Neither ruling is final, but no date has been set for an appeal, said lawyer Maher Naguib.
A video was leaked showing the boys, aged 15 to 17, mimicking an Islamic show of piety and the beheading of a supposed victim.
The 30-second privately recorded clip takes a swipe at the self-proclaimed Islamic State, which released a video on 15 Feb. last year showing the actual beheading of 21 Christians – all but one of them Copts – on a beach in Libya.