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Egypt Detains 1,000 Muslim Brotherhood Protesters
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The
authorities have fluctuated in their attitude towards the protests
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Additional
Reporting by Mohamad Gamal Arafa, IOL Staff
CAIRO,
May 5 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Egyptian authorities
detained about 1,000 people during nationwide demonstrations organized
by the banned but usually tolerated Muslim Brotherhood in favor of
political reform, judicial sources said on Thursday, May 5.
Public
prosecutors or state security prosecutors are questioning about 400 of
them, 120 of them in the eastern Nile Delta province of Sharkia, where
12 policemen were injured in clashes during the protests on Wednesday,
May 4, the sources said.
The
authorities are expected to either release the remaining 600 or detain
them without charges, they added.
Mohamed
Habib, the deputy leader of the influential Islamist group, said that
the Brotherhood had counted 1,562 people still in detention from
Wednesday and that the police had referred hundreds to the prosecution
for possible charging.
The
Brotherhood said last month that it was negotiating with the interior
ministry on holding a massive demonstration that would oppose foreign
intervention in Egyptian politics while simultaneously pressing for
more rapid political reform.
“But
they rejected this idea and we of course said: 'Okay, we will stage
those demonstrations or stand-ins.' We had 60,000 people over 15
provinces,” Habib told Reuters on Thursday.
Independent
estimates of the size of the demonstrations were difficult to obtain
from areas outside Cairo but the number of detentions suggested that
taken together they were the most successful protests this year in
Egypt.
Egypt
has seen a spate of political protests this year, mostly against a
fifth six-year term for President Hosni Mubarak in presidential
elections expected in September.
Different
Reactions
The
authorities have fluctuated in their attitude towards the protests,
sometimes allowing them to go ahead, sometimes thwarting them in
advance and sometimes detaining participants, according to Reuters.
Habib
said: “We had hoped the security would be more responsive, more
peaceful and civilized, because in our view it is their job to protect
demonstrations, not to suppress them.”
The
response of the authorities to the Muslim Brotherhood challenge
differed from place to place. In the northeastern province of
Damietta, demonstrators have been ordered detained for four days for
questioning on suspicion they belonged to a banned organization and
organized an unlicensed protest.
Founded
in 1928, the Brotherhood is probably the largest opposition group in
Egypt. It says it wants to bring change by democratic means in the
Arab world's most populous country.
Egyptian
political observers said the group seeks to gain politically by the
protests, including getting an official recognition as a legal
political force especially after Mubarak ruled that out in an
interview last month.
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