Egyptian security forces stand by their armoured personnel carriers

REUTERS

A Cairo court on Sunday sentenced a man to five years in jail and another 75 people to one-year suspended sentences in connection with attacks on the Israeli and Saudi embassies in Cairo last year, a court official said.

The man sentenced to five years, named Omar Afifi, had fled abroad and was tried in absentia, reports Reuters.

Protesters stormed the Israeli embassy in Cairo in September following the killing in August of five Egyptian security guards by Israeli soldiers pursuing militants who had ambushed and killed eight Israelis along the Israeli-Egyptian border.

Some of the protesters also attacked the nearby Saudi embassy with stones.

The defendants had been accused of "attacks on diplomatic missions", according to the public prosecutor.