Egypt. On 8 July, Prime Minister Qandil, after initially deciding to remain in his position until the formation of a new government, submitted his resignation effective immediately in protest of the subsequent bloodshed to the recent coup d'état when 51 protesters were killed by the military at the Republican Guard headquarters. In mid-November, Morsi claimed that he was kidnapped and held in a Republican Guard house on 2 July. He said that he had been kept there until 5 July and forcibly moved again to a naval base where he spent the next four months. The spokesperson of the Egyptian Armed Forces, Colonel Ahmed Ali, later denied the rumors that Morsi was badly treated, saying that they had nothing to hide. The Egyptian Army later gave Catherine Ashton the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy for the European Union the permission to meet Morsi. Ashton later stated that Morsi is doing well, saying "Morsi was keeping up with the latest developments in the country through television and newspapers. So we were able to talk about the situation, and we were able to talk about the need to move forward. The people around him do care for him. I looked at the facilities." Morsi later met with an African Union delegation. Trial After his overthrow, Morsi faced several charges including inciting the killing of opponents protesting outside his palace, espionage for foreign militant groups including Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), for escaping Wadi el-Natroun Prison during the 2011 revolution prior to his election as president, leaking classified documents to Qatar, in addition to "insulting the judiciary." On 1 September 2013, prosecutors referred Morsi to trial on charges of inciting deadly violence. The date was set for 4 November 2013. Morsi was to be tried in a criminal court for inciting his supporters to kill at least 10 opponents, use violence and torture protesters. The prosecutors' investigation revealed that Morsi had asked the Republican Guard and the minister of interior to break up his opponents' sit-in but they refused, fearing a bloody result before Morsi's aides asked his supporters to break up the sit-in with force. On 18 December 2013, Prosecutor General Hisham Barakat ordered the referral of Morsi to criminal court on charges of espionage, in a report headed "The Biggest Case of Espionage in the History of Egypt". According to the