(AFP PHOTO/AHMED TARANH)
By AbdelHalim H. AbdAllah and Aya Nader
The Ministry of Health announced in a statement Saturday that the death toll during protests reached seven and injuries totalled 47.
The ministry said that two deaths occurred in Minya, two in Giza and three in Cairo. Injuries occurred in the governorates of Giza, Alexandria, Fayoum, Isamailia, Minya, Cairo, Assiut and Beni Suef.
The ministry confirmed that the death toll for Friday’s clashes, meanwhile, had risen to 14, with 77 injured.
The Front to defend Egyptian Protesters released a list with the names of those arrested, which included 48 protesters, five lawyers and six students.
In the Maadi Police Station, police officers assaulted human rights lawyers Amr Imam and Mahmoud Belal as they attempted to reach detained protesters inside the station on Saturday.
Imam, a lawyer working with the Hisham Mubarak Law Centre, was hit in the chest with the back of a pistol and was held at gunpoint. “They told me that they are ‘closed for today’ and counted down to shoot,” he said.
According to Belal, police forces were authorised to fire live ammunition.
Four girls and a number of boys were arrested at noon while protesting near the Maadi metro station, where they had been chanting for “bread, liberty, and social justice” (the oft-repeated basic demands of the 25 January Revolution), and “down with all traitors, be they the military, remnants of the former regime, the interior [ministry] or the Muslim Brotherhood.”
Imam said that the lawyers managed to get food to the detainees with difficulty and only through intermediaries. “Definitely, charges will be fabricated for them,” he said, asserting that the detained are “simply Egyptians” with no affiliations to any party or movement.
Lawyer and activist Ragia Omran said that they would file complaints on Sunday against violations by security personnel.
The Ministry of Interior was not available for comment.
