Jordanian police shut Brotherhood headquarters in Amman

Amman: Police in Jordan sealed the headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood in Amman on Wednesday, a senior figure in the movement said, as the authorities clamp down further on the kingdom's most vocal opposition group.
The Brotherhood, which is close in ideology to its Egyptian namesake and has strong ties with the Palestinian movement Hamas, wants sweeping political reforms.
Police acting on orders of the Amman governor evacuated staff and closed off the building, giving no reason for their actions, said the Brotherhood senior member, Jamil Abu Bakr.
Government spokespeople and police were not immediately available for comment.
The Brotherhood has operated legally in Jordan for decades and has substantial grass-roots support in major urban centres.
Its political arm, the Islamic Action Front, is the kingdom's largest opposition party and represents many Jordanians of Palestinian origin, who are in the majority in the population of seven million.
Grossly underrepresented in parliament and government posts, many of the Brotherhood's Palestinian supporters in the major cities see them as defending their interests.
"We are not a group that is rebellious or operating outside the law. This is not an appropriate means to deal with us... deploying heavy-handed security measures against us rather than reaching understandings," Abu Bakr told Reuters.
Jordan has been tightening restrictions on the Brotherhood in the last two years, forbidding their public rallies and arresting vocal government dissenters.
Earlier this year, the movement's deputy leader Zaki Bani Rusheid was released after serving an 18-month jail sentence for criticising on social media the United Arab Emirates for its crackdown on hardliners.
His detention was the first of a major political opposition figure in Jordan in recent years.