CAIRO, May 22 (Aswat Masriya) – A Cairo court accepted on Sunday an appeals request submitted by activists Ahmed Douma, Ahmed Maher and Mohamed Adel and reduced their punishment from six to one month in a case where they were accused of "attacking a court guard."

Maher, co-founder, and Adel are part of the April 6 youth movement. The movement was one of the main actors in the January 2011 Uprising, which resulted in the ouster of former president Hosni Mubarak after he ruled the country for 30 years. 

The case dates back to December 2013 when the activists allegedly attacked a police officer as they were being transported in the Maadi neighbourhood during their trial in another case of illegal protest.

The prosecution accused the defendants of "verbally assualting a public employee while on duty."

The three activists are currently serving prison sentences in other cases.

They were handed a three-year prison sentence in December 2013 for defying the protest law.

Earlier in May, Egypt’s Court of Cassation rejected a request by Douma to suspend the life imprisonment sentence he had been handed on charges of illegal assembly and attacking security forces in 2011 in what became known as the "cabinet clashes".

Douma and 229 others were sentenced to life in prison in Feb. 2015. Thirty-nine of the defendants received 10-year prison sentences in absentia; they are all juveniles.

The court however fined all 269 defendants EGP 17 million (around $1.9 million) for vandalism.

Douma’s lawyer filed an appeal against the verdict with the Court of Cassation in April 2015. The appeal demanded the suspension of the sentence and that the case be referred to another court circuit. 

The Court of Cassation is yet to rule on the appeal, while Douma continues to serve his sentence.