CAIRO: Al Jazeera English reporter Sherine Tadros reported on Twitter that live ammunition has been used and heard in Egypt's northern port city of Alexandria. In Cairo, protesters and police have been clashing nearly non-stop since early morning Friday as hundreds of thousands of Egyptians have poured onto streets across the country in celebration of the second anniversary of the beginning of the 2011 uprising that ousted dictator Hosni Mubarak. Dozens of protesters hurled stones at security forces stationed behind the cement wall in Sheikh Rihan's Street in downtown Cairo. Police responded with barrages of tear gas against the protesters. The protesters have gathered at the intersection of Sheikh Rihan's Street and al-Qasr al-Aini Street near the concrete barrier that was erected in November last year during violent clashes near Tahrir Square. Clashes erupted on Thursday between demonstrators and security forces in al-Qasr al-Aini Street after some protesters had attempted to remove concrete blocks from the cement wall in the street. Sixteen people were injured in yesterday's clashes according to a Ministry of Health statement. Activists and observers reported that protesters were hurling stones at police near a new concrete wall on the main Qasr el-Aini street leading to the square as police fired tear gas at the protesters to disperse them. It comes after clashes erupted on Thursday after protesters took down the same barrier earlier in the day. Egyptian protesters tore down a wall leading from central Cairo's Tahrir Square to the two houses of Parliament and begun clashing with police near the Shoura Council, or Upper House of Parliament. It came after small skirmishes between activists and police occurred earlier on Thursday on Qasr el-Aini street in downtown Cairo, spurring the military to erect yet another concrete barrier on the main thoroughfare. Riot police used tear gas in an effort to disperse the protesters near the parliament building. By evening, the military was already rebuilding the wall taken down by the activists. Medical teams and ambulances are now stationed outside the square as tension fills the air on the second anniversary of the revolution that ousted Mubarak. Many activists tell Bikyanews.com that the goals of the revolution have not been fulfilled and accused the Muslim Brotherhood and President Mohamed Morsi of usurping the ideas of the revolution to fit their own Islamic agenda. BN
