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Despite the curfew that started a few hours go in Egypt's three turmoil-hit governorates of Port Said, Suez and Ismailia due to the recent bloody clashes, a lot of anti-government protestors took to the streets Monday night, fearlessly violating the curfew and ignoring the deployed armed forces.
Thugs are seen at Al-Horreya French school near Tahrir square in Cairo, Egypt, Jan. 26, 2013. Up to 30 people were killed and over 300 others injured in clashes that erupted Saturday outside Port Said prison between security forces and family members of 21 convicts who were sentenced to death over the Port Said massacre, state TV reported. During the ongoing clashes tens of thugs sabotaged and stole things from the private school, taking advantage of the storming chaos all over the Egyptian capital. (Xinhua/Amru Salahuddien)
Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi on Sunday imposed a 30-day curfew and a state of emergency in the three governorates, which witnessed over the past few days bloody confrontations between anti-government protesters and security forces that killed dozens and injured over 1,000.
In Port Said, thousands of people marched for demonstrations in rejection of the curfew and the state of emergency.
"If they wanted to secure the city, they did not have to impose a curfew and an emergency state," Mahmoud, a 35-year-old clothing store owner in Port Said, told Xinhua, "Now all stores are closed and army is deployed, but protests are going on without friction with army."
Mohamed, a 48-year-old contractor, said the curfew is a normal step to restore security, but he is against the state of emergency, arguing that ending the emergency law was one of the demands of the 2011 protests that toppled former President Hosni Mubarak.
The situation was not much different in Suez, as throngs of people headed to the al-Arbaeen Square to protest the curfew.
"Suez is blazing," said Suez resident Ashraf al-Adawi, "I see the armed forces deployed outside vital institutions in the city, but the protestors intend to spend the whole night in the square."
For his part, Alaa, a 34-year-old worker in the petroleum field, told Xinhua that Morsi's decision of imposing a curfew and a state of emergency "was correct, and also too late," noting that thugs have recently been prevailing in the city.
Alaa also denounced anti-Morsi protests and criticized the opposition's rejection of the president's invitation for dialogue, stressing that Morsi was a freely-elected president that should only be ousted through the ballot box.
Hours ago, Egypt's main opposition bloc, the National Salvation Front (NSF), announced at a press conference its refusal to Morsi' s call for dialogue. "The prosecutor-general should be sacked and a national salvation government should be formed," the NSF's leading member Hamdeen Sabahy said when stating some of the NSF's preconditions for engaging in the dialogue.
In Ismailia, 48-year-old Mohamed Saqr told Xinhua that thousands of people of all ages marched through the main Mohamed Ali, al-Thalathini and Reda streets toward al-Mamar Square in defiance of Morsi's recent decisions.
"We in Ismailia all strongly reject Morsi's decision to isolate us and separate the canal governorates from the rest of Egypt," Saqr added, wondering why Morsi did not impose a curfew in Cairo, where protests are still going on downtown.
Cairo, like Saqr said, has been witnessing continuous clashes all Monday until after midnight, with hundreds of both police forces and anti-government protestors injured near iconic Tahrir Square.
Among the protestors was Egyptian poet and writer Mehat al-Adl, who told Xinhua that he came to Tahrir to join the protestors because he believed there was no real change in the country over the past two years.
