CAIRO: Medical sources and those close to families of protesters who were killed last week in Egypt's clashes, have confirmed to Bikyamasr.com that mourning families and relatives are being threatened by state authorities, who have told them not to talk to the press. Consequently, they reported the families of the dead would face a withdrawal of the money promised to them by security officials to compensate for the death of their loved ones. The official death toll, frozen at 41 by health ministry estimates, is strongly disputed by independent media and activists. Medical sources have told Bikyamasr.com that the number of dead brought into morgues during the fighting was over 100 people. As the un-official death count had passed a hundred, a member of the ruling Security Council of the Armed Forces Maj Gen Mukhtar al-Mouallah on Thursday apologized for the recent killing “of martyrs from among Egypt's loyal sons.” He did not comment on the cause of their deaths and urged Egyptians not to compare the military to the former regime of President Hosni Mubarak, insisting they were not seeking to cling to power. “Our hearts bled for what happened,” al-Mouallah said, promising that compensation would be paid to the families of the dead. This compensation money now seems to have taken on the character of a heavy incentive for families not to talk to the press about the deaths during the protests that ruptured Egypt less than a week ahead of Monday's election start. A reporter from Bikyamasr.com was due to meet families of those deceased in and around Tahrir Square on Wednesday to discuss the death of their relatives, but the families backed out. It was later explained to the reporter from a source close to the relatives, that they had been told not to show the press any death certificates, which a number had been altered to show an alternative cause of death. If they do, the compensation money promised to them from the SCAF, would be taken back. At the Zeinhom morgue in the Sayida Zeyneb area of Cairo, the bodies of deceased from state hospitals and the streets were received daily, including a reported 32 over Wednesday and Thursday, sources close to the morgue told Bikyamasr.com. The administration of the morgue as early as Monday told Bikyamasr.com that they had been ordered by the SCAF not to give out any information to journalists, nor let them into the morgue. Reports came last week that death certificates were being manipulated to obscure the actual causes of death, a measure clearly used to bring down the official death toll. At the Zeinhom morgue last week, the courtyard was constantly filled with mourning women and men crying for the loss of their sons and daughters. On Tuesday, relatives stated to Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram, that they refused to leave the morgue until the military officially accepted to take the blame for the killing of the activists. One man said that the report issued by the hospital on the death of his young nephew was falsified. It stated he died of severe low blood pressure, although it was clear to a naked eye that “he had been shot by a bullet to the neck.” These reports are further supported by the fact that similar manipulations happened after the killing of 27 activists in what is known as the Maspero massacre on October 9. Then, clashes broke out after the country's military, security forces and citizens fired upon a protest claming Coptic rights and protection in front of Egypt's state TV building. BM
