The leader of an Egyptian Islamic group which assassinated former president Anwar Saddat 22 years ago voiced "deep sorrow" for his murder and called him a "martyr," an Arabic newspaper reported in Cairo Tuesday.
"Saddat died a martyr during civil strife," Jamaa Islamiya leader Karam Zohdi said in a Cairo prison interview with Asharq al-Awsat.
Saddat was shot and killed by Khaled al-Islambuli, who was one of several Jamaa members who surged from the ranks of a military parade on October 6, 1981 and attacked the official reviewing stand in northern Cairo.
Zohdi, head of the Jamaa's ruling consultative council, who was interviewed in Cairo's Tora prison, expressed "deep sorrow" for having approved the assassination.
"If time could be turned back" he would not have approved the attack and would have tried to prevent it, he was quoted as telling the paper. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
