Egypt arrests Mursi's ex-prime minister on his way to Sudan

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian security forces on Tuesday arrested the former prime minister of ousted Islamist President Mohamed Mursi who was sentenced to one year in jail for failing to implement a court ruling to renationalize a textile firm. "Security forces managed to arrest Hisham Kandil, former prime minister, in carrying out a court order issued against him. He was caught in a mountain area with smugglers trying to flee to Sudan," Egypt's interior ministry said in a statement. Kandil was appointed in July 2012 by Mursi after he won Egypt's first truly democratic elections that followed the fall of autocratic President Hosni Mubarak in 2011. Mursi was ousted by the army in July after protests against his rule. The judgment against Kandil was issued in April 2012, while Mursi was still in office and was upheld by a higher court in September. The case related to the sale during the Mubarak era of a state-owned firm to a private investor. The army-led government had launched a fierce crackdown on Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood group and its Islamist allies in which hundreds have been killed and thousands injured. It has also banned the Brotherhood group, calling it "a terrorist organization". At least 15 people were killed in a suicide bomb attack on a security compound in Nile Delta on Tuesday, in the most recent militancy operation that became common in Egypt after Mursi. (Reporting by Yasmine Saleh, editing by David Evans)