Egypt's Friday of Final Warning: a blow by blow update

As per tradition, Ahram Online's correspondents around the country report on the events of yet another revolutionary Friday as they happen

18:40 In Tahrir, number of protesters is increasing as the heat fades.
18:30 Ahram Online reporter made a tour of Tahrir Square and met with protesters. Everyone is here for a different reason, but put together, they make up a coherent list of demands behind the weeklong sit-in.
A 1973 war veteran who used to drive a tank is here for a new cabinet: "Sharaf's government failed to be a government for the poor and must go. Not one minister! All of them. The military council's statement is equally unacceptable. [General] El-Fangari raised his finger to threaten the Egyptian people. He should have been wagging it at Israel."
Ayman Youssef, from the popular committee in Imbaba, is against the recent police reshuffle: "Shuffling corrupt officers from one station to another does not amount to a real purge of the police force."
A poet speaking at the People's Podium, as its sponsors called it, under a banner that says “Against the Military Council”, wants social justice, the redistribution of wealth: “Human rights means that I can live with dignity in my own country.”
Nearby, hundreds are gathered to sign a petition organised by the Democratic Workers Party, titled “The campaign to gather one million signature with the aim to exert public pressure on Sharaf to renationalise public sector companies privatised and sold below market value to local and international investors.” The petition also calls for the repeal of the law Sharaf passed criminalising strikes and sit-ins
Yahia Abu Ooaf is a member of the Revolution'a Artists Union, a group of painters who gather near Kentucky to supply the square with new revolution paintings; they have been doing so since 25 January. He tells Ahram Online that he is not satisfied with PM Sharaf's recent promises to make concessions to revolutionaries. "But Sharaf is not the source of the problem,” he elaborates. “SCAF makes the decisions." He suggests forming a new SCAF with younger officers who are honourable and not tainted by corruption. Still, Yehia is willing to give Sharaf one more chance to meet the people's demands; he does not call for his immediate resignation.
Essam El-Sadr, a doctor at the Kentucky field hospital, provides emergency medical services: “We treated more than 70 cases today, 10 blood pressure and diabetes cases; the rest were people who needed either medicine or new bandages for old injuries.”
18:12 In Suez, despite small number of protesters, Suez Youth Block says sit-in will continue tomorrow.
17:15 The leader of the movement for independent syndicates, Kamal Abou Eita, is on Tahrir's central podium. He announces that he will continue his sit-in "with the people" on Tahrir until all the revolution's demands are met and all those who killed protesters are prosecuted.
16:47 Hundreds have temporarily left Tahrir and taken to the sidestreets to escape the blazing sun. Man in his mid-sixties claims that remants of Mubarak's NDP are still controlling most of the countryside.
Popular committees to defend the revolution are distributing more than 3,000 copies of their weekly bulletin, 'Revolutionary Egypt'. Its headline: "We demand prosecution, the gang is still in power."
Ayman Youssef, a member of the popular committee in Imbaba, where sectarian clashes took place last month, tells Ahram Online: "Our committee is mobilising people from local neighbourhoods to come to support Tahrir. We brought 200 people from Imbaba two nights ago and will be bringing more from different areas to support the sit-in."
16:43 Protests are underway in Tanta too (90 km north of Cairo), where hundreds have marched through the city streets on their way to the governorate headquarters where they are starting a sit-in.Demonstrators are repeating chants against the SCAF and the Ministry of the Interior.
16:18 In Assiyut, hundreds of protesters from different political factions are protesting in solidarity with the Tahrir Square revolutionaries' demands. “You Fangary with a gun, take action with the thieves.” Protesters have also released a statement saying the latest communique from the SCAF fails to satisfy the revolutionaries' demands.
16:14 Some Twitter users have begun to mock the pro-SCAF Roxy protest, making jokes about its small size. The users have made a special hashtag "#Roxy" for relating the news and jokes. Among the comments widely retweeted: "The protesters at Roxy decided to transfer the protest to one of their friends' apartments".
16:10 Luxor is seeing a march against the practices of the Ministry of the Interior and the SCAF. Activists in the southern city are now staging a sit in at Abu El-Haggag Square in solidarity with the protesters on Tahrir.
15:40 In Sharqiya, hundreds are gathered in front of the governorate building where they are continuing a sit-in in solidarity with Tahrir protesters. Demonstrators are raising the same demands, including speedy trials for those accused of shooting protesters and the end of military trials for civilians. The Sharqiya sit-in also began one week ago.
15:30 Numbers in Tahrir are increasing, but the turnout is still less than expected. "Honestly the sight of the square brings diarrhoea and that is why am not going to post the pictures now. Maybe the numbers will increase in a while," tweets @Dr_Mokka Eslam Nour el-Den, writer of the famous 'Poor First' blog, expressing his disappointment.
As the sun becomes intolerably fierce, one woman passes out, while around 500 men are seen chasing a a man accused of pickpocketing. Some 3,000 protesters are now chanting for a purge of the state media of pro-Mubarak figures. On the largest podium in the square, the mother of a martyr calls for "justice for blood".
15:16 In Alexandria, hundreds are currently protesting in front of security headquarters in response to the appointment of Khaled Gharba as new head of the directorate. One protester has climbed the building's flagpole, removed the Ministry of the Interior standard and replaced it with the Egyptian flag. Protesters are repeating their chants against the SCAF, Sharaf and the Ministry of the Interior.
14:57 Demonstration is gaining strength in Suez's Arbaeen Square where protesters now number in the tens of thousands, says Ahram Online reporter in Suez. Anti-SCAF and anti-Ministry of the Interior chants are heating up and raising passions on an already exceptionally hot day.
14:51 Several hundreds of protesters are gathered around the "youth podium" across from Hardee's on Tahrir Square, listening to chants against Field Marshall Tantawi, the head of the SCAF. "Tantawi take your decision - are you with the people or with Mubarak?" goes the cry.
A Wafd higher committee member, Safwat Abdel Hamid Mohamed, is on stage. "We will chase Mubarak dead or alive. This is the meaning of revolutionary justice," he tells the crowd.
14:49 A protest is taking place in front of the international hospital in Sharm El Sheikh, where ousted president Mubarak is currently being held. Protesters are calling on the authorities to transfer Mubarak from the Red Sea resort to Tora prison near Cairo.
14:46 In Roxy, the Heliopolis square where the counter-demonstration of some 1000 pro-stability protesters is taking place, an Ahram Online reporter was accosted by several "burly men", according to our colleague, from the UK. "You could cut the tension directed towards me with a knife. They didn't like that I am a foreigner," says our reporter, adding that some large men approached him and asked for his journalist ID. They said there were spies in the crowd. "One protester thought my ID was fake," our British reporter adds.
14:45 Public security checkpoints at Tahrir Square have managed to stop 50 thugs from entering the protest. The thugs, carrying firearms and knives, were 'arrested' inside the underground metro station and outside it. Checkpoint members took the suspects to nearby military units in order to file a report on the incident.
14:40 The 6 April Movement announced its support for Prime Minister Essam Sharaf's efforts towards the creation of a genuine revolutionary government, and put forward 6 basic demands as terms for ending the nation-wide protest action. These are: the formation of a revolutionary government, without interference from the Supreme Military Council in the appointment of even a single minister. Other demands including the sacking of the head of the Central Auditing Authority, Gawdat El-Malat, for covering up the corruption of the Mubarak clique. State institutions should be purged of all remnants of the deposed regime, foremost among which the judiciary, the media, the health and education sectors. The list also includes the annulment of the law restricting the right to demonstations and strikes; and ending the referral of civilians to military trials, and setting a fair minimum wage, tied to inflation.
14:10 Protesters in Tahrir are chanting "I don't feel any change [taghyeer] I am a person from Tahrir". Many political parties, old and new, are present on the square, handing out flyers and hanging party posters. Participants include Wafd, Al-Adl, Nasserists, the Democratic Front, the Egyptian Social Democratic Party the People's Alliance and others.
14:00 Around a thousand protesters have joined the counter-demonstration in Roxy Square, Heliopolis. The army and police are barring the pro-stability protesters from taking their protest outside the square.
13:40 At Tahrir Square, the numbers of protesters are growing swiftly. Too many microphones are shouting slogans, poetry and speeches, all at the same time, and each stage has anything from hundreds to thousands thronging it, depending on the size of stage.
13:30 In Suez, the march from the Shohada mosque is heading first to the Suez police department to protest the torture of activists on Wednesday. A statement demanding the trial of the police officers involved will be handed over to the Governor's office.
13.20: In Suez, the numbers are still low in Arbaeen Square. The demonstrators coming from Shohada Mosque are yet to arrive. Four ambulances are in the square, in the scorching hot weather.
13:17 Tens of thousands are in Tahrir now, considerably less than last Friday, however, but much more than during the past days. Two more stages are now set up near Kentucky, one for the Wafd Party and another for the Nasserist Party. Wafd members are handing out the party's daily newspaper for free.
13:05 In Tahrir Square chants are focusing on Mubarak, the general prosecutor and the ministry of interior.
13:00 In Alexandria, the preacher delivering the Friday sermon told protesters that the ruling authorities were trying to kill the revolution, and that six months after the revolution, "our demands have not been met."
12:57 Friday prayers are over. Chants begin against the ruling Supreme Military Council. Hundreds of organisers, dressed in T-Shirts inscribed with the words "Square Police", are in control of all entry points to Tahrir, checking IDs and conducting body searches. Entry points are divided into two, one for women controlled by women volunteers and another for men, controlled by men volunteers. Tens of thousands are thronging into the square.
12:30 In Suez, hundreds prepare for a march from Shohada (Martyrs) Mosque to El Arbayn Square after Friday prayers. Islamists, including the Salafists, the Wasat Party, and the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party have boycotted the protest. For its part, the Suez Youth Bloc, which includes youth of a wide range of political forces, say the sit-in will go on beyond the Friday of Final Warning and until such a time as all parties agree and all demands are met.
12:10 Friday sermon begins. The Preacher, the Imam of Omar Makram Mosque, at the south eastern edge of the square, is addressing the protesters from the main stage. He is hailing the Egyptian men and women who launched the Egyptian revolution. He also condemned the attempts of the counter-revolution to create strife between Muslims and Christians, saying that standing on his right upon the stage was Hani Hanna, a Copt and a friend. Addressing himself to Prime Minister Essam Sharaf, the preacher said there would be no unemployment if the top government officials were not receiving such exorbitant salaries and bonuses. He demanded that a ceiling should be set on civil service wages.
12:00:Thousands are gathered in Freedom Square in the North Sinai city of Al-Arish to join in the Friday of Final Warning. Political forces including the Committee to Protect the Revolution in North Sinai, a coalition of the Krama and Wafd parties and the Revolutionary Socialists warned in a statement against allowing the revolution to backtrack. They warned against the subversive acts of members of the now dissolved former ruling party, the NDP.
11:58 According to our correspondent who has been camping with the protesters in Tahrir Square the tents are more crowded that usual. This could be due to the overpowering heat or the sheer swell in numbers for the Friday of Final Warning. Chants are going round of "Where are the Free Officers?" in reference to the Army officers who took part in protests in Tahrir on 9 April and have not been heard of since military police entered the square, violently broke up the protest and arrested the rebel officers.
Issues of social politics in the square have featured prominently this week. In one such incident, a beggar was given a carton of water of bottles to sell to prevent begging in the sit-in. "Let her sell things instead," one man said. Others objected that this would only encourage even more beggars to come each day for handouts to sell. No final decision on how to deal with the issue has been reached.
One street painter is displaying for sale drawings of the infamous 'Battle of the Camel' of 2 February. Street vendors, a common and necessary feature of the sit-in, were removed from the square in the early morning of Wednesday only to be allowed to return later in the day.
11.56 More street vendors are spreading into the four corners of Tahrir square. Their numbers are exceeding the average of the past days.
11.40 In Suez, hundreds protesters are gathered. The Arbayin square is calm. Protesters are preparing the square for the Friday prayers.
11:37 The main stage in Tahrir has started broadcasting patriotic songs. Hundreds are chanting against what they describe as the corrupt media bent on covering up the truth, other chants are calling for the release of revolutionaries held in military prisons.
11:30 The Egyptian third army has deployed large forces throughout Suez to protect the Suez Canal, banks, businesses and police stations in the city in anticipation of the Friday of Final Warning. Third Army troops are also ensuring that roads leading to the city are kept open. Protesters in Suez had blocked roads leading into the city earlier this week, and threatened to block navigation through the Suez Canal.
11.05 Thousands already gathered in Tahrir. A few hundreds chanting but stages are not active yet.
10:45 Thousands of protesters are flocking already to Tahrir, joining the few thousands who have been sitting in in the square since last Friday. Sit-in sites in other cities, especially Alexandria and Suez, are witness to similar throngs coming in for the “Friday of Final Warning”, which if the early outpouring of protesters is any indication promises to be massive.
The protesters are calling on Prime Minister Essam Sharaf to join them in Tahrir Square. They are demanding that ousted president Hosni Mubarak be transferred from the Sinai resort of Sharm El-Sheikh to Tora Prison near Cairo, as a prelude to putting him on public trial. In an ONTV programme Thursday night, Ossama El-Ghazali Harb, the leader of the Democratic Front Party, said Mubarak's trial should be televised. “Saddam Hussein's trial was televised, why shouldn't Mubarak's,” he asked.
Anti-protest groups, for their part, are preparing a counter-demonstration in Roxi Square in the north Cairo district of Heliopolis. Some 10 km separate the demonstration and the counter demonstration, so there is little chance of a confrontation.
The Muslim Brotherhood, which after much hesitation had joined last Friday's protest, had announced its boycott of the Friday of Final Warning. However, as has been a common occurrence since the start of the Egyptian revolution on January 25, the youth of the group dissented and declared they would be joining. Two Salafist groups, the Arab Twahid Party, and the Peace and Development Party also announced they would be taking part, saying they cannot “leave the street” at this “crucial time” in which Egypt's future is being determined.
The Ministry of Health has declared a state of emergency, in readiness for expected sufferers from the intense heat, especially among the increasing number of protesters who have been on hunger strike.