Around 3,000 people could benefit from President Morsi's pardon of political protesters, the head of the committee tasked with implementing the decision said Wednesday.

"The pardon includes those arrested [during protests] at Tahrir Square, the Cabinet building, Mohamed Mahmoud Street, Abbasiya,  Maspero and in various other governorates," Judge Mohamed Fawzi, head of the president-appointed Civil Rights Protection Committee (CRPC), told Al-Ahram newspaper on Wednesday.

President Morsi issued the pardon on Monday to mark his hundredth day in office. It applies to all political protesters, except those convicted of murder, arrested "while trying to support the revolution" between 25 January 2011 and his inauguration on 30 June 2012.

The number was an estimate, Fawzi said, adding that an official list would be drafted within a month by the public prosecution in coordination with the interior ministry, the prison service, and military and civilian prisons.

In a comment that adds some confusion to President Morsi's statement that the pardon would include all those detained and tried in incidents related to Egypt's uprising, Fawzi said the committee would distinguish between those arrested for defending themselves and those arrested for deliberately committing crimes or acts of vandalism.

The CRPC was formed by President Morsi to investigate cases of civilians detained by the military.