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Egypt's top soccer player assets seized due to link with Brotherhood: official

Xinhua, May 9, 2015 Adjust font size:

Some assets of former top soccer player Mohamed Abu Trika were seized due to connection with the currently-blacklisted Muslim Brotherhood group, state-run news agency MENA quoted a Justice Ministry official as saying on Friday.

A committee for running and seizing the funds of the Brotherhood group, led by an assistant justice minister, said that the As-hab Tours travel company belonging to Trika was co-founded by a Brotherhood member.

"The manager of the seized company, Anas Mohamed, is one of the criminal Brotherhood elements and he is currently detained over a case related to taking part in acts of aggression against the state," MENA quoted Yasser Aboul-Fotouh, the committee's secretary-general, as saying.

As one of the best players of Egypt's number one club Al-Ahly, Abu Trika was named the best African player inside the continent in 2008 and was awarded the best player in Africa in 2014, to be the first footballer officially awarded after his retirement.

Abu Trika is believed to have rejected the violent security dispersal of two massive sit-ins held by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohamed Morsi.

The crackdown in mid-August 2013, over a month after Morsi's overthrow, left about 1,000 of Morsi's loyalists killed and thousands more arrested.

In late 2014, the Brotherhood has been designated by the new military-oriented leadership as "a terrorist organization" after a series of blasts targeted security premises and personnel, although the group denied connection to them.

He has also been against the Israeli offensives on the Palestinian Gaza Strip, as he showed written on his undershirt "Sympathize with Gaza" while running at the field celebrating scoring one of his goals in 2008.

Known for his modesty, good manners and benevolence, the seizure of some of his assets annoyed a lot of football fans as well as some fellow soccer professionals.

The ex-player presented to the committee a petition against the seizure of his assets that will be studied and finalized just like those presented by other sized companies and individuals.

"The committee sticks to the law and carries out the court rulings regardless of the names and titles of the defendants, for all are equal before the law," said the committee's chief. Endit