Egypt activists vow more protests as 1 000 arrested

CAIRO – Pro-democracy activists vowed yesterday to step up the largest anti-government protests in Egypt in three decades, despite mass arrests and mammoth security following two days of street clashes.

The protests against the autocratic rule of President Hosni Mubarak, inspired by the groundbreaking ‘Jasmine Revolution’ in Tunisia, have sent shockwaves across the region and prompted Washington to prod its long-time ally on democratic reforms.Events on the streets sent jitters yesterday through Egypt’s stock exchange, which suspended trading temporarily after a drop of 6.2 per cent in the benchmark EGX 30 index, a day after it fell six per cent.Members of the pro-democracy youth group April 6 Movement said they would defy the ban on demonstrations and take to the streets again yesterday, while calling for mass demonstrations after today’s Muslim prayers.Opposition groups circulated SMS messages and posted appeals on social networking site Facebook for fresh demonstrations ‘to demand the right to live with freedom and dignity’.According to a security official, at least 1 000 people have been detained around the country since the demonstrations started on Tuesday.Medics have reported the deaths of six people – four protesters and two policemen – in violence linked to the protests, with 55 protesters and 15 police injured.Egyptian opposition figure and former UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei, meanwhile, was due back in Egypt from Vienna yesterday, his family told AFP.ElBaradei recently told a German magazine that Egyptians should be able to follow the lead set by the toppling of Tunisia’s veteran president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.’If the Tunisians have done it, Egyptians should get there too,’ ElBaradei told Der Spiegel.Demonstrations in central Cairo continued into the early hours of yesterday, ending when police fired tear gas and made further arrests.The authorities on Wednesday declared a ban on demonstrations, which police immediately enforced after having on Tuesday, the first day of the protests, stood back to allow the nationwide demonstrations to go ahead.The United States, Egypt’s chief ally in the Arab world, meanwhile issued a nuanced written statement in Obama’s name on Egypt.’The Egyptian government has an important opportunity to be responsive to the aspirations of the Egyptian people, and pursue political, economic and social reforms that can improve their lives and help Egypt prosper,’ it said.The protests are the largest in Egypt since bread riots in 1977, four years before Mubarak came to power.Political discontent has been rumbling in Egypt since parliamentary elections in November, which were widely seen as rigged to allow candidates from Mubarak’s ruling National Democratic Party to record a landslide victory.- Nampa-AFP