Alexandra | Wednesday
AN Egyptian university student in Alexandra was killed on Tuesday when police opened fire with rubber-coated bullets at students protesting a visit by US Secretary of State Colin Powell to Cairo, hospital sources said.
Mohammed Ali al-Sayyed al-Saaa, a business student at the University of Alexandria, was killed when a rubber-coated bullet hit him in the chest, the sources said. Police also confirmed his death without giving the circumstances.
More than 200 people, mainly students but also around 40 policemen, were wounded and transported to three hospitals in Alexandria, hospital officials said, updating an earlier casualty toll.
A student taking part in the protest said a second student had died after being injured, but police and other officials could not confirm the report.
Students contacted by AFP said five protestors were seriously wounded.
”Colin Powell get out of here, our country will remain free,” protestors chanted before the clashes erupted.
The clashes erupted when most of the nearly 7 000 students taking part in the protest left the campus in the direction of a nearby US cultural centre, police and protestors said.
Police said they fired tear gas and water cannon, while protestors said police also opened fire with rubber-coated bullets.
Witnesses said Saaa was killed when police used batons to beat a group of students, prompting another group to hurl stones at the police, who then opened fire with the special bullets, made of metal but coated with a layer of rubber.
It was not immediately clear if Saaa fell inside or outside the campus, but police said the students ransacked stores and smashed nearly 100 cars as they headed toward the US cultural centre.
He was the first protestor to have been killed in a wave of angry protests by Egyptians in reaction to Israel’s military action in the West Bank.
The situation had calmed down by the evening, but students said they were planning another protest on Wednesday.
In Cairo, several hundred people staged another protest outside the People’s Assembly and between 10 000 and 15 000 students rallied inside the northern Cairo campus of Al-Azhar Islamic university, burning US and Israeli flags, witnesses and security sources said.
”Burn, burn the flag of America, which is our enemy, not our friend,” protestors chanted as they torched a US flag. They then shouted an expletive about Powell, telling him ”Our hearts are in Palestine.”
They also burned an Israeli flag outside the parliament building.
Mass protests have raged in Egypt and across the Arab world since March 29 when Israeli troops stormed the West Bank and penned Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in his headquarters in the city of Ramallah.
Under emergency laws in force since 1981 when Islamic militants assassinated president Anwar Sadat for making peace with Israel, Egypt has banned demonstrations, though it tolerates them on campus.
Powell held talks in Cairo with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, on the second leg of a peace mission which has taken him to Morocco and will also include visits to Spain, Jordan, Israel, and the Palestinian territories.
US President George Bush sent Powell to the region amid Arab and world uproar over the offensive that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon launched March 29 after a spate of Palestinian militant suicide attacks, notably one which killed 27 Israelis celebrating a Jewish holiday.
Commentators in the government-run press echoed popular rage at what is widely seen as flagrant US bias toward Israel and expressed doubt whether he would succeed in obtaining an Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian land.
Powell told a press conference he intends to meet with isolated Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat on his emergency peace mission, responding to Arab fears the United States backs Israeli efforts to sideline him.
He also said he expects the Palestinians to call a halt to suicide bombings against Israelis, while renewing demands that Israel expedite its withdrawal from Palestinian territory. – Sapa-AFP