Egitto, la polizia ad Alessandria ha appena attaccato i dimostranti in uscita dalla moschea

Fresh protests erupt in Egypt

Protesters take to the streets across cities demanding President Mubarak’s ouster despite a security clampdown.

Last Modified: 28 Jan 2011 11:10 GMT

Protests have erupted in across cities in Egypt following Friday prayers, with angry demonstrators seeking a change in government.

Rawya Rageh, Al Jazeera’s correspondent reporting from the port city of Alexandria, said protesters streamed out of mosques to chant slogans against Hosni Mubarak, the country’s president for 30 years.

Police reponded by firing tear gas in a bid to disperse the angry crowd.

Protests were also reported from Suez and the Nile Delta cities of Mansoura and Sharqiya, the Reuters news agency said quoting witnesses.

Clashes between protesters and police erupted outside a mosque in the capital, Cairo. Protesters reportedly threw stones and dirt at the police after security forces confronted them.

They held up posters saying “No to dictatorship” and stamped on posters of Mubarak.

The protests in the Middle East’s most populous nation come amid a security clampdown.

Earlier, the government blocked internet, mobile phone and SMS services in order to disrupt the planned demonstrations.

For the past three days, cities across Egypt have witnessed unprecedented protests against the 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak, the president.

Apparently inspired by the recent turmoil in Tunisia, the determined protesters have stood their ground against heavily-armed police and are refusing to relent until there is a change in government.

The violence has so far left seven people dead.

Networking sites

Earlier, anti-government activists put messages on Facebook social networking site, listing more than 30 mosques and churches to organise the protests.

“Egypt’s Muslims and Christians will go out to fight against corruption, unemployment and oppression and absence of freedom,” the page with more than 70,000 signatories said.

The Associated Press news agency reported that an elite special counterterrorism force had been deployed at strategic points around Cairo as Egypt’s interior ministry warned of “decisive measures”.

Safwat Sherif, the secretary-general of the ruling National Democratic Party, told reporters on Thursday:  “We hope that tomorrow’s Friday prayers and its rituals happen in a quiet way that upholds the value of such rituals …and that no one jeopardises the safety of citizens or subjects them to something they do not want.”

Meanwhile, a lawyer for the opposition Muslim Brotherhood said that 20 members of the officially banned group had been detained overnight.

Abdel-Moniem Abdel-Maksoud said two of the most senior members detained were Essam El-Erian, Brotherhood’s main spokesman, and Mohammed Moursi, a prominent Brotherhood leader.

ElBaradei joins the protests

Mohamed ElBaradei, the former head of the UN nuclear watchdog turned democracy advocate, also joined the demonstrators after returning from the Austrian city of Vienna, where he lives.

Earlier, ElBaradei, a Nobel peace laureate, said he was ready to “lead the transition” in Egypt if asked.

The Muslim Brotherhood had avoided the protests in previous days, but late on Thursday it announced that its members would take part after Friday prayers.

Fierce clashes

Earlier on Thursday, protesters hurled Molotov cocktails at a fire station in the city of Suez, setting it ablaze on Thursday. At another rally near Giza on the outskirts of Cairo, police used tear gas to break up hundreds of protesters late at night.

Related

Timeline: Egypt Unrest

A chronicle of the demonstrations against the country’s leadership.

Profile: Hosni Mubarak

Mubarak, Egypt’s third and longest-serving president, has ruled the country since 1981.

When Egypt turned off the internet

Egypt goes off the digital map as authorities unplug the country entirely from the internet ahead of protests.

Cairo, normally vibrant on a Thursday night ahead of the weekend, was largely deserted, with shops and restaurants shut. In Ismailia, hundreds of protesters clashed with police who used tear gas and batons to disperse them.

“This is a revolution,” one 16-year-old protester said in Suez . “Every day we’re coming back here.”

“The intensity continues to increase,” Al Jazeera’s Jamal Elshayyal reported from Suez.

“There have been fierce clashes with rubber-coated steel bullets being fired by the riot police as well as tear gas.”

Human Rights

Human Rights Watch said Egyptian police had escalated the use of force against largely peaceful demonstrations, calling it “wholly unacceptable and disproportionate”.

Barack Obama, the US president, urged both the government and protesters to show restraint as they expressed their “pent-up frustrations”.

“It is very important that people have mechanisms in order to express legitimate grievances,” he said as he answered questions from an online audience on the YouTube website.

Obama also urged Mubarak to make changes to the political system to appease the angry protesters.

“I’ve always said to him that making sure that they are moving forward on reform – political reform, economic reform – is absolutely critical for the long-term well-being of Egypt.”

Da Al Arabiya: