Map via @Houeida Anouar
Tunisia December 15:
2011-02-01 Tunisian Islamic Leader Returns as EU Freezes Ousted President's Assets
2011-01-27 Tunisia protests continue as a warrant is issued for Ben Ali
2011-01-24 Tunisia today: "It’s not a unity government, it’s a fake unity government”
On February 3, 2011, Marietje Schaake addressed the EU parliament on the situation in the Mediterranean, in particular in Tunisia and Egypt. Schaake also called for an investigation into any corporations that might have facilitated the human rights abuses.
Video of her address:
Analysts are warning of a food crisis in Egypt. Stratfor reports that, in the best-case scenario, the country has less than 40 days demand left.
At 2:30 PM Egypt time, there are well over a million Egyptians in and around Tahrir Square. The atmosphere is being described by Al Jazeera as a festival atmosphere. CNN has Anderson Cooper reporting from the protests. And, reports are circulating on Twitter indicating Egyptian State TV is running images of Cairo looking serene, void of protesters, and flashing a “Protect Egypt” banner on screen during music videos.
The millions are deliberating over whether to march to the presidential palace or not. Having a foothold in Tahrir Square gives Egyptians control over Cairo, the power to keep the city’s business halted, and that gives them tremendous leverage as the opposition continues to push for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to step down.
UPDATE:
9:30pm Cairo - Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak has just given a speech in which he vowed not to run for president in the fall but would not step down until them. He said protests are "manipulated by political forces" in his TV address. Initial reaction from the estimated two million people still protesting in central Cairo is that he has to go now.
6:00pm Cairo - Tweets and news reports we are seeing as the Sun sets in Cairo indicated that the Million Man March has been an overwhelming success. Araby tweets "2 Million in Alexandria. Almost 3 Million in Cairo. Around half a Million Suez. It's happening."
People on Tahrir Square in Cairo where Al Jazeera is reporting 2 million people have gathered are saying that they aren't leaving until Hosni Mubarak does. People are standing shoulder to shoulder in the famed Tahrir Square, the atmosphere is lively but peaceful as protesters wave signs a loft and chant slogans demanding that Mubarak go. Someone even hung an effigy of Mubarak from a street sign. The army has placed barbed wire around Mubarak's residence and they have been checking protesters for weapons as they entered the square but they have done nothing to stop the march.
Since 1981, President Hosni Mubarak had legally affected a 30 year-old state of emergency to avoid appointing a vice president. His unwillingness and distrust of sharing power, may be due in part to his experience as vice president during Sadat’s assassination.
Egyptian Succession Rumors
Like an Egyptian version of an Elizabethan engagement, rumors of vice presidential appointments, were evident as far back as 2005. U.S. State Department Cable 05CAIRO04534 cites Omar Suleiman, the former intelligence chief and recently appointed vice president, as the most likely heir apparent. (See WL Central's coverage of Oman Suleiman.)
US state cable 08CAIRO2572 from December, 2008 details the experiences of an April 6 activist who attended the December 3-5 "Alliance of Youth Movements Summit, and met with US government officials, on Capitol Hill, and with think tanks. "He alleged that several opposition parties and movements have accepted an unwritten plan for democratic transition by 2011; we are doubtful of this claim. ... April 6's stated goal of replacing the current regime with a parliamentary democracy prior to the 2011 presidential elections is highly unrealistic, and is not supported by the mainstream opposition."
The Guardian: UK firm's partner 'wanted Peru to curb priests in mine conflict areas'
"BHP Billiton associate urged removal of teachers and clergy, according to leaked US embassy cables.
A mining company in Peru part-owned by a British FTSE 100 company agitated for the removal of teachers and Catholic bishops to new posts away from "conflictive mining communities", according to a leaked US cable obtained via WikiLeaks."
El País: Estados Unidos dibuja un panorama desolador de la sanidad en Cuba (The United States presents a devastating landscape of the Cuban public health system)
"Los mejores hospitales solo están al alcance de los extranjeros y de la élite política, según los despachos desde La Habana. (The best hospitals can only be reached by foreigners and the political elite, according with the [American] offices in Havana.)"
El País: Mubarak agitaba ante EE UU el miedo al caos y al islamismo para negarse al cambio (Mubarak talked in front of the United States his fear to chaos and islamism as an excuse to refuse change)
"'Presión no, pero estamos dispuestos a ser persuadidos', le dijo a un senador. ('There's no presure, but we could be persuaded', he said to an [American] senator.)"
It is morning again in Cairo as I post this. The curfew ended at 8:00am and the people of Egypt enter the seventh day of their history making struggle. A famous poem by the early 20th century Tunisian poet Abu al-Qasim al-Shabi, "To the Tyrants of the World" [hear it on NPR] has become a rallying cry in both Tunisia and Egypt.
Millions of Egyptians were in violation of the government curfew again last night after a sixth day in which people have taken to the the streets to demand regime change. What started with tens of thousand of demonstrators only a few days ago in three major cities has now developed to the point where the majority of the people of Egypt from virtually all walks of life are demanding the removal of Hosni Mubarak and all his cronies from power.
This morning the Egyptian army is erecting barricades in central Cairo as the government vows to enforce the curfew which it has moved forward three hours to 3:00pm today. Today also the unions are calling for a general strike throughout Egypt and on Tuesday the April 6 Youth Movement has called for a demonstration of a million Egyptians in Cairo.
Completely unintentionally, revolution has been the theme of this week. I read Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy Of The Oppressed and saw the musical Fela! courtesy of the National Theatre broadcast. The South Africa retelling of the story of Christ (Son of Man) mirrored Fela! remarkably – for good and ill. The documentary on Antonio Negri (A Revolt That Never Ends) explored the workers movements in Italy in the 70′s, and his academic work on the Multitude since his time in prison.
According to Al Jazeera and confirmed by CNN the Cairo offices of Al Jazeera have been ordered shut down by Egyptian authorities. A statement from Al Jazeera in part states:
Al Jazeera sees this as an act designed to stifle and repress the freedom of reporting by the network and its journalists," the network said. "In this time of deep turmoil and unrest in Egyptian society it is imperative that voices from all sides be heard; the closing of our bureau by the Egyptian government is aimed at censoring and silencing the voices of the Egyptian people
The live coverage currently being shown on Al Jazeera live, is feed taken from Egyptian state television.
More coverage can be found here: Al Jazeera
Egyptian authorities have revoked Al Jazeera Network's licence to broadcast from Egypt.
The information minister [Anas al-Fikki] ordered ... suspension of operations of Al Jazeera, canceling of its licences and withdrawing accreditation to all its staff as of today," a statement on the official Mena news agency said on Sunday.
An Al Jazeera spokesman said that the company would continue its strong coverage regardless.
Prior to learning of the license revocation, Al Jazeera English correspondent Dan Nolan announced that there had been a series of threats from an unspecified source; eventually, the office received a visit from "plain clothes government security" officials ordering Al Jazeera out.
Gov’t agents say they’ve been watching our coverage but also listening to our phone calls.
Al Jazeera regards this latest act of censorship
Information technology as development has been central to Egyptian economic policy since 1999, when Mubarak appointed Ahmed Nazif, the recently resigned Prime Minister, to a newly created post, Minister for Communications and Information Technology.
As the former Minister of CIT, Nazif established Egypt's free internet connectivity plan and improved public access to computers (Source: Wikipedia). But, as Prime Minister, Nazif extended the application of Egypt's thirty-year old state of emergency law. The Overseas Press Club of America observes that notwithstanding remarks made by the regime that the law is "only to be invoked during proclamations of emergency," the fact is "authorities continue to use the emergency law to detain dissidents, including journalists and respected bloggers.”
Dr. Tarek Kamel was elevated to his current post as Egypt's Minister of CIT when Nazif, his former boss was appointed PM. Nazif in turn picked Kamel to replace him. (Source:Khaled Fatta)
Kamel, like Nazif believes that social and economic channels exists primarily to reinforce regime power. As a techno-bureaucrat, Kamel lobbies the Internet as the "backbone of social-economic development," but only when it pacifies public dissent and 'backbones' the regime. When public dissent threatens the status quo, the Internet gets turned off.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak announced on Egyptian state television today that he has sworn in a new vice president, former Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman. US state cable 07CAIRO1417 states that according to Article 82 of Egypt's constitution, the vice president should assume presidential powers "if on account of any temporary obstacle the president is unable to carry out his duties."
So who is the new vice president who, in the seemingly imminent departure of President Mubarak may begin ruling Egypt? Jane Mayer asks the question in her article today in the New Yorker, and answers it with information from her book The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned Into a War on American Ideals. "Since 1993 Suleiman has headed the feared Egyptian general intelligence service. In that capacity, he was the C.I.A.’s point man in Egypt for renditions—the covert program in which the C.I.A. snatched terror suspects from around the world and returned them to Egypt and elsewhere for interrogation, often under brutal circumstances."
As anti-government protests persist and curfews continue to be violated by protesters, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak announced on Egyptian state television Saturday that he has sworn in a new vice president, former Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman; former Civil Aviation Minister Ahmed Shafik was sworn in as the new prime minister. Suleiman is the first vice president to be appointed since Mubarak assumed office. Shafik is a well-respected former Air Force officer.
Al Jazeera English Live reports that military commanders have been circulating Cairo today announcing over loudspeakers that Egyptian residents must take precautions to preserve their dignity and discourage violence and looting. Egyptian residents on the scene in Cairo report that they are feeling "unprotected" by the police, which appears to be a either too busy or unwilling to answer phone calls or make itself visible in various areas were looting and theft are taking place. A rumor is being widely circulated that the "police minister has left the country".
US State cable 2010-02-25 10CAIRO253 records that Government of Egypt officials, on February 24, expressed concern over the U.S. recommendations at the February 17 UN Human Rights Council's Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Egypt's human rights record.
Presidential advisor Soliman Awad said the U.S. should focus on principles regarding religious freedom, not conversions and proselytizing which "makes Egyptians suspicious". MFA Deputy Director for Human Rights Omar Shalaby said the GOE was displeased with both the number and the tone of U.S. recommendations, "especially in light of recent bilateral cooperation in the UN Human Rights Council." He said that on instruction from the MFA, Ambassador Shoukry had conveyed this message to Vice President Biden's staff during a meeting to discuss the Vice President's planned upcoming visit to Cairo, and the Egyptian Permanent Representative in Geneva had made these points to the U.S. Mission. Shalaby explained that although European countries made many of the same recommendations, the GOE was "less bothered" because it does not enjoy "the same level of cooperation with the Europeans."
Now that Mubarak is trying to pull the plug on the Internet in Egypt, the hacker activist group Anonymous is going Old-School, dusting off the old fax machines and using them to agitate for change in Egypt.
According to the website Fast Company:
Members of the group are organizing to fax copies of the Egypt-related cables that WikiLeaks released today to schools in Egypt. The hope apparently is that if they can get the faxes into the hands of students, students will distribute them to other protesters. A source told Forbes the goal was to warn them that the police could not be trusted. The WikiLeaks cables, which describe human rights abuses and political arrests, "are just more proof of that," the source said.
In another trip down memory lane in the area of communications technology, some activists in Egypt are digging their modems out of storage as Anonymous plans how to spread the word about a French ISP that is setting up free dial-up Internet access for people in Egypt.
Anonymous has started Operation Egypt, issued this statement and setup this Facebook page.
US State cable 2010-02-23 10DOHA70 details a February 14, 2010 meeting between Senator John Kerry and the Amir of Qatar. In the meeting, the Amir stresses the importance of Israel's return of the Golan Heights to Syria. Hamas "for sure," he said, will accept the 1967 border but will not say it publicly so as to lose popular Palestinian support. The Amir accuses Egypt of delaying an agreement between Israel and Palestine to extend their own role. "According to the Amir, Fatah and Hamas agreed on a memorandum of understanding, but the Egyptians wanted it changed." The Amir offers to deliver a message from the US to Iran.
Syria
US State cable 2010-02-11 10CAIRO197 from one year ago, discusses the arrest on the morning of February 8, of three high-ranking members of the Muslim Brotherhood's Guidance Bureau (the group's 16-member administrative body) along with twelve other lower ranking members
The group includes newly-named Deputy Supreme Guide Mahmoud Ezzat, MB spokesman (one of three recently-named spokesmen for the group) Essam El Eryan, and MB "Mufti" (or religious leader) Abdel Rahman El Barr. A fourth member of the Guidance Bureau, Mohie Hamed, avoided arrest. According to Ikhwanweb, the MB's English-language website, Hamed has been ordered to appear before the Supreme State Security Prosecutor. One of the twelve other MB detainees arrested along with them has reportedly been transferred to a hospital for heart surgery following a heart attack during his arrest. MB sources have reported to the media that those detained have declined to give any statements to investigators. These latest high-profile arrests come amid continued reports of arrests of dozens of rank and file MB members outside of Cairo reportedly as they gather in preparation for elections of the MB's 100-man Shura Council (the group's legislative body) scheduled for April 2010.
US State cable 2010-01-12 10CAIRO64 from one year ago, discusses the use of the State of Emergency, in effect in Egypt almost continuously since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
The Emergency Law
Article 3 of the Emergency Law allows the president to order "placing restrictions on personal freedom of assembly, movement, residence, traffic in specific areas at specific times," and "the arrest of suspects or individuals threatening public security and order," and arrests and searches without implementation of the law of criminal procedures..." In practice, the Interior Ministry carries out "the order" of the President either orally or in writing.
Article 3 also authorizes surveillance of personal messages and confiscation of publications.
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