A file picture taken on June 7, 2014 shows Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Badie gesturing as he shouts from inside the defendants cage during his trial in the capital Cairo. A court in Egypt on June 19, 2014 sentenced to death Badie and 13 others over violence that killed 10 people in Cairo in summer 2013. AFP PHOTO /KHALED DESOUKI

MINYA – An Egyptian court on Saturday confirmed death sentences for 183 Islamists, including Muslim Brotherhood chief Mohamed Badie, a prosecutor said, after a speedy mass trial that sparked an international outcry.

The court in the central city of Minya had initially sentenced 683 people to death, but on Saturday it commuted death sentences of four to life in prison, including two women, and acquitted 496 other defendants.

Since the army ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July last year, hundreds of his supporters and Badie himself have been sentenced to death in trials that have been criticised by Egyptian and global human rights bodies.