Clashes erupt between protesters, Mubarak supporters
CAIRO: Opponents and supporters of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak fought in central Cairo on Wednesday in what appeared to be a move by the strongman to stamp out nine days of protests calling for him to quit.
Protesters said some of the Mubarak supporters were members of the hated police forces in plain clothes. Some rode into the crowd on horses and camels and in horse-drawn carriages, wielding whips and sticks.
People fought each other with fists, sticks and stones while troops surrounding the square made no attempt to intervene. Reuters correspondents saw dozens of injured. Many people fled in panic.
The fighting broke out as international pressure grew on Mubarak to quit and his closest ally, the United States, told him bluntly that a political transition must begin immediately.
After Mubarak went on national television on Tuesday night to say he would not stand in elections scheduled for September, the armed forces said the protesters' demands had been heard and it was time for them to clear the streets.
Soon after several hundred pro-Mubarak supporters entered Tahrir (Liberation) Square, where a few thousand protesters had gathered, and the clashes broke out, witnesses said.
It was the ninth day of protests that erupted last week as public frustration with corruption, oppression and economic hardship under 30 years of rule by Mubarak boiled over.
An opposition coalition, which includes the Islamist organisation the Muslim Brotherhood and Nobel peace laureate Mohammed ElBaradei, responded to the army warning by calling for more protests.
It said it would only negotiate with Vice President Omar Suleiman, a former intelligence chief appointed by Mubarak at the we! ekend, o nce Mubarak stepped down. Mubarak's offer to leave in September was his latest gambit in the crisis. At the weekend he reshuffled his cabinet and promised reform but it was not enough for protesters.
One million people took to the streets of Egyptian cities on Tuesday calling for him to quit.
International backing for Mubarak, for three decades a stalwart of the West's Middle East policy and styled as a bulwark against the spread of militant Islam, has crumbled as he tried to brazen out the crisis.
US President Barack Obama spoke to Mubarak for half an hour by telephone on Tuesday night after the 82-year-old announced his plan to step down in September. "What is clear and what I indicated tonight to President Mubarak is my belief that an orderly transition must be meaningful, it must be peaceful and it must begin now," Obama said after speaking to him. Pressure also came from Turkey, an important diplomatic voice in the Muslim world.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said Mubarak's plan to step down in seven months time did not meet the people's expectations and the change should begin sooner. France, Germany and Britain also called for a speedy transition.
"The transition needs to be rapid and credible and it needs to start now," British Prime Minister David Cameron told the UK parliament.Some of the few words of encouragement for him have come from oil-giant Saudi Arabia, a country seen by many analysts as vulnerable to a similar outbreak of discontent.Israel, which signed a peace treaty with Egypt in 1979, is also watching the situation in its western neighbour nervously, weighing the possibility that anti-Israeli Islamists might gain a share of power.
Protesters said some of the Mubarak supporters were members of the hated police forces in plain clothes. Some rode into the crowd on horses and camels and in horse-drawn carriages, wielding whips and sticks.
People fought each other with fists, sticks and stones while troops surrounding the square made no attempt to intervene. Reuters correspondents saw dozens of injured. Many people fled in panic.
The fighting broke out as international pressure grew on Mubarak to quit and his closest ally, the United States, told him bluntly that a political transition must begin immediately.
After Mubarak went on national television on Tuesday night to say he would not stand in elections scheduled for September, the armed forces said the protesters' demands had been heard and it was time for them to clear the streets.
Soon after several hundred pro-Mubarak supporters entered Tahrir (Liberation) Square, where a few thousand protesters had gathered, and the clashes broke out, witnesses said.
It was the ninth day of protests that erupted last week as public frustration with corruption, oppression and economic hardship under 30 years of rule by Mubarak boiled over.
An opposition coalition, which includes the Islamist organisation the Muslim Brotherhood and Nobel peace laureate Mohammed ElBaradei, responded to the army warning by calling for more protests.
It said it would only negotiate with Vice President Omar Suleiman, a former intelligence chief appointed by Mubarak at the we! ekend, o nce Mubarak stepped down. Mubarak's offer to leave in September was his latest gambit in the crisis. At the weekend he reshuffled his cabinet and promised reform but it was not enough for protesters.
One million people took to the streets of Egyptian cities on Tuesday calling for him to quit.
International backing for Mubarak, for three decades a stalwart of the West's Middle East policy and styled as a bulwark against the spread of militant Islam, has crumbled as he tried to brazen out the crisis.
US President Barack Obama spoke to Mubarak for half an hour by telephone on Tuesday night after the 82-year-old announced his plan to step down in September. "What is clear and what I indicated tonight to President Mubarak is my belief that an orderly transition must be meaningful, it must be peaceful and it must begin now," Obama said after speaking to him. Pressure also came from Turkey, an important diplomatic voice in the Muslim world.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said Mubarak's plan to step down in seven months time did not meet the people's expectations and the change should begin sooner. France, Germany and Britain also called for a speedy transition.
"The transition needs to be rapid and credible and it needs to start now," British Prime Minister David Cameron told the UK parliament.Some of the few words of encouragement for him have come from oil-giant Saudi Arabia, a country seen by many analysts as vulnerable to a similar outbreak of discontent.Israel, which signed a peace treaty with Egypt in 1979, is also watching the situation in its western neighbour nervously, weighing the possibility that anti-Israeli Islamists might gain a share of power.
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