Infos zum Thema egypt

Tonight, protesters have surrounded the parliament building in downtown Cairo. There have been two deaths of protestors in Suez; one policeman has died in Cairo, hit by a rock. The protestors in Tahrir Square have been tear-gassed, and Twitter has been blocked within the borders of Egypt. But this morning, as the sun burned a smoky haze off the face of this city, the streets were open and clear as I rode downtown at 8 a.m. There had been tweets that protests would be staged in Tahrir Square and in the downtown neighborhood of Mohandeseen. These tweets were received by Egyptian authorities monitoring the hashtag #jan25, and they deployed a massive security presence to deter any demonstrations. Officers stood in groups of 6 to 8, on nearly every street corner. They blockaded the entrance to the parliament building. The teams stood quietly with folded arms watching the empty streets as the sun rose over the Nile. Around the block, I exited my taxi and sat down at a nearby hotel for coffee, waiting as the hours passed. I saw six trucks of police pass on the highway, heading south to Mohandeseen. I jumped into a taxi and followed them. But here as well, only a small army of police guarded the downtown commercial district. Not a demonstrator was in sight, and sensing this protest had ended before it would begin, I went home. When I arrived, the Twitter hash #jan25 lit up. Someone said that earlier tweets had been deliberately planted as decoys to mislead authorities. Now, in dozens of real locations throughout the city, protesters had begun to mobilize. I ran out the door and took the subway back to Tahrir Square. When I arrived, the protest had begun. In the street a group of close to 200 Egyptians, mostly men, were standing, chanting and waving flags. Blocking both sides of the street were lines of police in riot gear. Immediately surrounding them, outnumbering the protesters, were older Egyptian men and young women.