New violence rocked the administrative heart of Cairo on Saturday as troops and police deployed after clashes with protesters against continued military rule left eight people dead and 299 wounded. Caretaker Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzuri further raised tensions by accusing the protesters of being counter-revolutionaries and denying that security forces had opened fire as they broke up the sit-in launched against his nomination last month.
Troops and police moved to retake control of the area around the cabinet offices early on Saturday, erecting razor-wire barriers on access roads. But after a few hours of calm, new clashes erupted between demonstrators and security forces, overshadowing the count in the second phase of the first general election since the ouster of president Hosni Mubarak in February.
Protesters hurled stones and petrol bombs. Friday’s fighting, which raged from dawn well into the night, was the bloodiest since five days of protests in November killed more than 40 people just ahead of the first round of the phased parliamentary election. “The people demand the execution of the field marshal,” the demonstrators chanted in reference to Hussein Tantawi, the head of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), which took over following Mubarak’s ouster.
Pictures of a military policeman grabbing a women by her hair, and of another looming over a sobbing elderly lady with his truncheon quickly circulated on the social networking site Twitter, enraging activists. But in a press conference on Saturday, Prime Minister Ganzuri accused the protesters of being counter-revolutionaries and denied that security forces had opened fire.
“Those who are in Tahrir Square (epicentre of the revolution that overthrew Mubarak in February) are not the youth of the revolution,” Ganzuri said. “This is not a revolution, but a counter-revolution,” added the man who first served as premier under Mubarak from 1996 to 1999.
He said 18 people had been wounded by gunfire on Friday and, without elaborating, blamed “infiltrators,” who he said “do not want the best for Egypt.” It was the SCAF’s nomination of Ganzuri as prime minister on November 27 that prompted the protesters to launch their sit-in outside the cabinet’s offices. They continued it after his interim government was sworn in on December 7. The demonstrators want the military to hand power immediately to a civilian administration with full powers.
The count continued on Saturday in the second stage of elections for the lower house of parliament. A third stage next month will be followed by a similar three-phase election to the upper house before the presidential vote.
