Mogul Who Paid for Ex's Murder Faces Execution

An Egyptian tycoon and the ex-cop he hired to kill his Lebanese pop singer ex-girlfriend have been sentenced to death by hanging, the BBC reports. The trial of billionaire Hisham Talaat Moustafa, an associate of president Hosni Mubarak's son Gamal, has gripped the Arab world. Although Suzanne Tamim was murdered in Dubai, the trial took place in Cairo, where the government imposed a news blackout.

The verdict "may deter some arrogant businessmen who thought there were no political or legal constraints on their ambitions as well as their sexual desires," an Egyptian commentator told the Los Angeles Times. Moustafa, a former member of parliament, was convicted of "incitement, agreement and assistance" in the murder of Tamim, who had left him for an Iraqi kick-boxer.
(More Egypt stories.)