Cairo: An Egyptian court handed down preliminary death sentences on Saturday to six defendants on charges of leaking secret state documents to Qatar in a case involving deposed president Mohamed Morsi.

Dr Morsi was not among the six convicts, who include two employees for the Qatari television network al-Jazeera.

On Sunday, unidentified gunmen killed eight policemen dressed in civilian clothes, including an officer, in an attack on a police vehicle in Helwan, just south of Cairo, the Egyptian Interior Ministry said.