Egyptian Prosecutor General Nabil Sadek on Sunday referred at least 67 individuals for criminal proceedings in the assassination of chief prosecutor Hisham Barakat. The move comes after it was announced that six individuals were arrested [Daily News report] or being held for assisting in the assassination of the prosecutor. The prosecutor general believes that the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas [official websites] conspired [ABNA report] together with more than 100 of their members to murder Barakat last year. It is believed that the murder was carried out in an attempt [Ahram report] to bring chaos and disorder into the country to destabilize the region. Hamas has denied [Press TV report] the allegations and has called on its members to abstain from actions inside the country.

Hisham Barakat [JURIST news archive], was killed [JURIST report] in October in Cairo by a car bomb attack on his convoy. Barakat’s vehicle was attacked [Al Jazeera report] by a car outfitted with explosives that were remotely detonated when his motorcade left his home in Heliopolis. The prosecutor’s death marks the country’s first assassination of a senior official in 25 years may be the result of retribution attempts by Islamic militants in response to the governmental crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood. It is believed that Barakat became a target as a result of his role as prosecutor against many Brotherhood members and other Islamists, including former president Mohammed Morsi [BBC profile]. An Egyptian militant group calling itself “Popular Resistance in Giza” claimed responsibility for the remote detonation of the car bomb that killed Bakarat, but the claim could not be independently verified.