REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, MINYA - The UN human rights office said mass death sentences contravened international law, referred to the death sentence on 529 supporters of ousted President Mohamed Mursi on Monday. The European Union and the United States also criticised the ruling, as did rights groups.

"Yesterday was ... a death sentence for the credibility and independence of Egypt's criminal justice system," said Nicholas Piachaud, a campaigner at Amnesty International.

Later on Tuesday, 682 others went on trial on Tuesday on charges including murder, their lawyers said.

"There is little hope of the 683 people indicted in this latest trial of receiving fair proceedings before the same judge who yesterday handed down death sentences so readily," Piachaud said on Tuesday.

Egypt's Justice Ministry official Abdel Atheem al-Ashari defended the death sentences, saying in a statement in response to the ruling that the separation between the state and the judiciary is one of the main principles of any democratic system.

There are no signs that Western powers will back their dismay with action to push for greater democracy in Egypt, which is of strategic importance because of its peace treaty with Israel and contains the Suez Canal, a global shipping lane.

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