Protestors plan one-million strong anti-Mubarak march
A coalition of Egyptian opposition groups have called for a million people to take to Cairo’s streets to ratchet up pressure for President Hosni Mubarak to leave.
American and other world leaders were also ramping up pressure for an orderly transition to a democratic system.
The coalition of groups, including the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, said it wants the march to take place tomorrow from Tahrir, or Liberation Square, to force Mr Mubarak to step down by Friday.
The groups also called for a general strike today, although much of Cairo remained shut down with government officers and private businesses closed.
“We don’t want life to go back to normal until Mubarak leaves. We want people to abandon their jobs until he leaves,” said Israa Abdel-Fattah, one of the protest organisers and one of the founders of the April 6 group, a grass-roots movement of young people that has been pushing for democratic reform since 2008.
Banks, schools and the stock market were shut for the second working day today. Long lines formed outside bakeries as people tried to replenish their stores of bread.
Barbed wire sealed off the main road to Tahrir Square, a central downtown plaza that demonstrators have occupied since Friday and have turned into the national focal point of calls for the downfall of Mr Mubarak.
They blame the president for widespread poverty, inflation and official indifference and brutality during his 30 years in power.
Thousands of people had gathered in the square by early this morning. Many slept sprawled on the grass or in colourful tents nearby.
Police and waste collectors appeared on the streets of Cairo and subway stations reopened after soldiers and neighbourhood watch groups armed with clubs and machetes kept the peace in many districts overnight.
One such group fended off a band of robbers who tried to break in and steal antiquities from the warehouse of the famed Karnak Temple on the east bank of the Nile in the ancient southern city of Luxor.
The locals clashed with the attackers who arrived at the temple carrying guns and knives in two cars and arrested five of them, said neighbourhood protection committee member Ezz el-Shafei.
The locals handed the five men to the army, which has posted a handful of soldiers at the vast temple’s entrance.
