Victims of deadly Egypt clashes remembered

Cairo: Hundreds of anti-government protesters on Tuesday gathered near Tahrir Square in Cairo, remembering more than 50 people killed in clashes with police two years ago.

“We want retribution from the killers,” chanted the protesters as they held pictures of the people killed during six days of clashes that started on November 19, 2011. The deadly fighting occurred in the Mohammad Mahmoud Street in the vicinity of the Interior Ministry headquarters.

As the protesters were on Tuesday converging on the street, police and military troops stayed away from the area including Tahrir, the focal point of an uprising that forced long-serving president Hosni Mubarak out of power in February 2011.

Security forces, positioned outside the nearby National Museum, fired tear gas to end clashes between opponents and supporters of the military.

The grassroots group Tamarod, which mobilised massive protests that helped the army depose Mubarak’s successor, Mohammad Mursi in July, said it would not participate in the commemoration for fear of violence.

Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood, meanwhile, said it would pay tribute to the slain protesters in anti-military demonstrations outside the presidential palace in the eastern Cairo area of Hadayek Al Quba.

The Brotherhood’s decision to stay away from Tahrir and its vicinity came after anti-Islamist activists vowed to bar followers of the group from attending the tribute ceremony, accusing them of being one-time allies of the military and the police.

“No entry to the Brotherhood, the military and the felul (Mubarak’s holdovers),” read a big banner hung across the Mohammad Mahmoud Street, also known as the Freedom Street.

Days before the anniversary, the military-installed government said the 54 people killed in the street two years ago would be considered “martyrs”, a move that entitles the victims’ families to state compensation.

Interim Prime Minister Hazem Al Beblawi on Monday unveiled a memorial for the slain protesters erected in the centre of Tahrir. Hours later, angry protesters demolished the structure.

“We don’t want a memorial. We want retribution,” Hassan Salem, a law student, said as he joined the tribute ceremony on Tuesday. “The government thinks it can dupe us by a structure of stones. The current regime is like those of Mubarak and Mursi.”

Large numbers of security forces were deployed at key state institutions in Cairo and beyond in anticipation of attacks.

Army troops, meanwhile, shot into the air to disperse scores of Islamist students, who tried to march on to the Defence Ministry headquarters near the Ain Shams University in Cairo.

Interior Ministry Mohammad Ibrahim warned earlier this week that security forces would not tolerate “any attempt to stir chaos” in the country.

Egypt has been gripped by political tensions and street turmoil that left more than 1,000 people dead, since Mursi’s toppling.