| CAIRO: Egyptian security forces detained 17 members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood on Saturday, security sources said, in a fresh step targeting the country's strongest opposition movement. The sources said the Brotherhood members were arrested at a home in Manoufiya province north of Cairo. They said authorities found anti-government books and pamphlets in the home. A spokesman for the Brotherhood said the members were on a private visit to the home of a member. He said the detentions brought to 87 the number of Brotherhood members being held in Egyptian jails. The arrests came days after a Cairo court overturned a decision to release two Brotherhood leaders, detained during anti-government protests in May, and ordered them to stay in jail for 15 more days. "These arrests come as a message from the regime to the Brotherhood indicating that the period of relative calm, which didn't last but a month, has ended," lawyer Abdel Moneim Abdel Maqsoud said in remarks published on the Brotherhood's Web site (www.ikhwanonline.com). The Muslim Brotherhood is officially banned in Egypt. But members elected as independents hold 88 seats in the 454-seat parliament, and the group operates openly within limits. |