Mosques across Turkey hold funeral prayers for Egypt's Morsi

Mosques across Turkey have held funeral prayers in absentia for Egypt's ousted former President Mohammed Morsi, who had close ties to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Morsi, Egypt's first democratically elected president ousted by the military in 2013, collapsed during a trial session in Cairo on Monday and died.

In the Turkish capital of Ankara, several hundred people held a protest outside the Egyptian Embassy on Tuesday, denouncing the government of current Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi and expressing support for Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood.

The prayer called by Turkey's religious authority Diyanet took place at the mosques across the country.

Civil society activists, citizens and Muslims from Egypt, Ethiopia, Somalia, Palestine, Syria and the Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region in China attended the gatherings organized by various non-governmental organizations to pay homage to late president.

Participants carried the Rabia sign and placards denouncing the Egyptian government and photos of Morsi.

Placards bore the slogans, "Coups will be defeated, Islamic movement will win", "The Islamic cause is immortal" and "Raise your voice for humanity".

"Today we have won a martyr in the path of God," an Egyptian university student Mumin Esref told reporters on behalf of the various organizations after the funeral prayer.

"Tyrants buried him quietly in the early hours of the morning, but he won," Esref said.

"The lament of underdogs who were martyred and enslaved in Egyptian dungeons will become an army and once again topple the coup authorities in Egypt."

Trade unions and civil society organizations were also present in the gatherings.

Morsi, a leading member of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, won Egypt's first free presidential election in 2012.

After only a year in office, however, he was ousted and imprisoned in a bloody military coup led by then-Defense Minister and current President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.

At the time of his death, Morsi faced a host of legal charges, which he, along with numerous human rights groups and independent observers, said were politically motivated.

Ankara's relations with Cairo deteriorated after the Egyptian military, then led by Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, ousted Morsi in 2013. Sisi then became president.

Erdoğan on Monday called Morsi a "martyr" and blamed Egypt's "tyrants" for his death.

Morsi, Egypt's first democratically elected president in 2012 after the Arab Spring uprisings, was overthrown after a turbulent year in power.

He was buried on Tuesday, as rights groups including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch called for an independent probe into the causes of his death.