protests – praag.org

Violence rocks PE

Violent protests rocked Port Elizabeth’s northern areas on Monday.

On Monday areas – including Gelvandale and Bethelsdorp – were ablaze over the closure of 33 schools due to a lack of teachers.

Talks between angry residents, principals, the Eastern Cape Education Department and other interested parties were expected to continue on Tuesday to avoid a repeat of Monday’s violence.

Protesters blocked roads with burning barricades, forcing the deployment of Public Order Policing and Tactical Response Teams to control the situation.

Photos and videos uploaded onto social media showed some protesters making petrol bombs. Others displayed spent bullet casings, claiming live ammunition had been fired into the crowd.

“It has calmed down a lot. The situation is slowly returning to normal. There are negotiations taking place at the moment,” she said on Monday evening.

Parents, pupils and even taxi drivers reportedly took part in the protests that erupted on Monday morning, with protesters also complaining about a lack of infrastructure at the schools, apart from the closures and a lack of teachers.

Police said: “Criminal elements seized the opportunity” to loot a shop in West End but law enforcement officers were able to disperse the crowd and prevent any looting from taking place.

“Six police vehicles and one vehicle belonging to a resident were damaged.”

Source: IOL

Germans take to the streets against Islam

Anti-immigration protest is sweeping across Germany, as thousands take to the streets against what they say is the growing “Islamisation” of the country.

Demonstrators have adopted the old rallying call of the protests against the East German communist regime that brought down the Berlin Wall 25 years ago, “Wir sind das Volk”. They say they want to preserve Western culture.

The protests come as Bavaria’s ruling Christian Social Union (CSU) is seeking to distance itself from a draft proposal for its party conference which said that immigrants should speak German not only in public, but at home as well.

Germany is now the second most popular destination in the world for migrants, after the US, and the country is struggling to cope with an unprecedented influx of asylum-seekers.

Thousands have defied sub-zero temperatures to join weekly marches each Monday in Dresden under the banner of Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of Europe, or Pegida.

The protests were started by a local man, Lutz Bachmann, with no background in politics. When he called his first demonstration in October, only a few hundred turned up, but the movement has snowballed, and last week 7,500 came.

Pegida has inspired similar movements across Germany. Though the numbers have not been as high as in Dresden so far, marches have been called in cities from Düsseldorf to Munich.

Bachmann has been at pains to stress that he is not opposed to genuine political refugees, only to economic migrants who “take advantage” of the German system, and has no problem with Islam but is worried about erosion of German culture.

Concerns for the German culture plunged Bavaria’s ruling CSU into its own controversy, after a draft proposal for the opening motion at the party conference called for immigrants to speak German at home.

“Whoever wants to live here permanently should be encouraged to speak German in public and within the family,” the draft said.

After a storm of criticism, including the Twitter hashtag YallaCSU, Arabic for “Let’s go, CSU”, and questions over how such a policy could possibly be enforced, Andreas Scheuer, the party’s general secretary, sought to limit the damage.

US racial inequality protests entering fifth day

From Chicago and Miami to Philadelphia and New York, angry race demonstrations in the US are entering a fifth day.

Protesters shut down freeways, chanting “I can’t breathe” and held “die-ins” in the streets. On Saturday, two police officers were injured as demonstrators smashed windows and hurled rocks at police, authorities said.

Black protesters are furious about a grand jury’s decision not to indict a white New York City police officer in the choking death of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man, and took to the streets nationwide late Sunday in a fifth day of demonstrations.

Officers used smoke and tear gas after crowds refused to disperse. Six people were arrested Saturday in Berkeley, bringing to at least 300 the number of people arrested across the country during the protests following the decision not to indict Officer Daniel Pantaleo.

Marchers in Berkeley, California, chanted: “Shut it down for Michael Brown.” The white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri who shot Brown, was also aquitted.

In Chicago, about 100 churches organized peaceful rallies throughout the day while in Miami protesters marched onto interstate 195, shutting down the causeway in both directions.

In Philadelphia, about 200 protesters and clergy staged a “die-in,” in which demonstrators lie down on the street, outside the South Philadelphia Sports Complex following the Philadelphia Eagles and Seattle Seahawks game.

Fans leaving the stadium could be heard jeering at the protesters. A black protester said such taunts show work remains to be done on educating people about racial inequality.

In Miami protesters marched onto Interstate 195, shutting down the road in both directions.

Black pro athletes joined in with their own form of protest Sunday: Davin Joseph, an offensive lineman for the St. Louis Rams, penned “I can’t breathe” on his cleats, and Johnson Bademosi, a defensive back for the Cleveland Browns, wore a shirt with the same message penned on the back. That followed Derrick Rose, a point guard for the Chicago Bulls, who on Saturday night also wore a shirt bearing the words during a pre-game warm-up.

Whites see harmony where blacks see racism

Alice Singen had always seen her home town Ferguson, Mo., as an integrated, harmonious place. Like many other white residents, she prided herself on staying here even when others began to leave.

But since the death of an unarmed black teenager at the hands of a white police officer, some African Americans are calling it segregated and racist. Now Singen has found herself talking in terms of “us” and “them,” “we” and “they.”

“I didn’t have any problems with anybody or any color, and all of a sudden it feels like we are being held responsible for something that’s not our fault,” Singen, 70, said as she left Faraci Pizza, a 46-year-old Ferguson business that has become a focal point of racial tension. “I don’t get it.”

That sense of shock is common here among Ferguson whites in the wake of 18-year-old Michael Brown’s death and the explosive protests in the days that followed.

The situation has forced many white Ferguson residents in this majority-black city — from small-business owners to the mayor and police chief — to question their beliefs about the community’s racial dynamics.

They have discovered that blacks and whites here profoundly disagree about the existence of racism and the fairness of the justice system. And now, whites who once believed their town was an exception in a country struggling with racial divisions have to confront the possibility it is not.

Between 2000 and 2010, the white population plummeted from 44 percent to 30 percent, while the black population grew from 50 percent to 67 percent.

In her majority-black neighborhood, a white house-owner staked an “I ♥ Ferguson” sign on her lawn.

Some of her neighbors reprimanded her for it. They interpreted the campaign as another way to mask the city’s injustice. Even the sign had two sides.

A Mexican American woman complained about how horrible it was to witness [black] teenagers getting tear-gassed.

“Well, we don’t know all the facts,” a white woman answered.

“But we do know that [Brown] had stolen those cigars, because we saw the video. And we know that the officer called him aside because he was jaywalking.”

Source: Washington Post

China warns US not to meddle in Hong Kong

China’s foreign minister made it clear Beijing would not allow other countries to meddle into its ‘internal affairs’, responding in this way to US Secretary of State’s call for Beijing to grant Hong Kong the “highest possible degree of autonomy.”

The American and the Chinese heads of foreign offices exchanged their views on the massive protests in Hong Kong before their talks at the US State Department on Wednesday.

“Hong Kong affairs are China’s internal affairs,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said. “All countries should respect China’s sovereignty. And this is also a basic principle governing international relations. I believe for any country, for any society, no one will allow those illegal acts that violate public order.”

Wang added he believed the current Hong Kong leadership was able to handle the large-scale sit-ins by itself.

The remark was made after US Secretary of State John Kerry reiterated Washington’s support for “universal suffrage” in Hong Kong, the main demand put forward by protesters in the Asian financial hub.

“We support universal suffrage in Hong Kong accordant with the Basic Law, and we believe in open society with the highest possible degree of autonomy and governed by rule of law is essential for Hong Kong’s stability and prosperity,” Kerry said.

Wang Yi received the same message from Barack Obama, whom he met later the same day, according to a White House statement about the meeting.

“The United States has consistently supported the open system that is essential to Hong Kong’s stability and prosperity, universal suffrage, and the aspiration of the Hong Kong people,” the statement reads.

Protesters in Hong Kong have been demanding election reform. They’re against the central government’s August decision to only allow Beijing-approved nominees run for the city’s leader post in the next election in 2017.

Sunday’s massive crackdown on thousands of protesters, when police use of tear gas, pepper spray and baton charges did not lead to a dispersal of the crowds. What it did inspire is more anger with Hong Kong’s current leader, Leung Chun-ying, with protesters starting to demand his resignation.

On Wednesday, a leader of the pro-reform protests warned the demonstrators were ready to occupy government buildings if the city’s chief didn’t step down by the end of Thursday.

An unnamed government source close to Leung says Hong Kong’s chief executive is ready to wait for weeks for the protests to quiet down.

“Unless there’s some chaotic situation, we won’t send in riot police… We hope this doesn’t happen,” the source told Reuters. “We have to deal with it peacefully, even if it lasts weeks or months.”

Source: RT

Tutu salutes uprising in Hong Kong

The purple cleric, archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu has called on “all who believe in democracy” to support the protests in Hong Kong his foundation said on Wednesday.

“I salute the courage of the hundreds of thousands of Hong Kong citizens who have participated in mass demonstrations in the territory in recent days to assert peacefully their right to have a say in the election of their leaders,” Tutu said in a statement.

“Their struggle is one that all who believe in the principles of democracy and justice should support.”

Thousands of demonstrators were blocking major roads in various districts of Hong Kong, continuing yet another colour protest that began Sunday.

Protesters are demanding reforms ahead of the 2017 elections, including the public nomination of candidates for next chief executive.

Tutu suggested that demonstrations were peaceful. He slammed the “attack on protesters” by law enforcement agencies.

“The firing of teargas at demonstrators, as happened on Sunday, was a bitter blow to what many still hope will be a peaceful, inclusive and dignified transformation process. I pray that the voices of the people of Hong Kong will never be stifled,” he said.

China said it would not intervene in the protests. The chaos could harm Hong Kong as a money destination to favour Singapore.

Rice wars simmer after Thai protest leader’s assassination

Regime gunmen assassinated celebrated Thai protest leader Sutin Taratin Sunday, during a brazen broad-daylight drive by shooting amid a melee between protesters and armed “red shirt” regime enforcers. Protests were held across the country at polling stations in opposition to advance voting.

Forty-five out of fifty polling stations were closed in Bangkok alone.

The assassination of Sutin Taratin came after the regime and its supporters made explicit threats of armed violence against any who opposed upcoming elections.

TIME magazine on January 16 reported in their article, “Bangkok Shutdown: Yingluck Supporters Prepare to Fight for Democracy,” that: “As Thailand’s anti-government protests enter their fourth day, observers say prospects for violent confrontation are increasing, with reports of government supporters stockpiling weapons in case of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra’s ouster.

“According to the Bangkok Post, radical members of the Red Shirts — diehard champions of Yingluck and her notorious brother Thaksin Shinawatra — are readying a cache of arms in case the 46-year-old premier is forced from office by either military or judicial intervention.”

The paper quoted a Red Shirt source as saying “There are strong anti-coup and anti-court sentiments among the red-shirt mavericks who are familiar and experienced with weapon use.”

The very next day, the attacks began. The first was a grenade attack on peaceful marches lead by protest leader Suthep Thuangsuban, which killed one and injured 39. Suthep Thuangsuban was only 30 meters away from the blast, indicating it was a likely assassination attempt.

Protesters would then storm the abandoned building where the attack originated to uncover what appeared to be a weapons cache and a safehouse, just as TIME described.

Another twin grenade attack took place at Bangkok’s Victory Monument, along with nightly drive-by shootings up until the regime announced a “state of emergency” citing their own terror campaign as justification.

After a conversation with Chareon Laothamatas, president of Thai Rice Exporters Association, reporter Michael Yon notes:

“Many people realize by now that the rice scheme in Thailand, under Yingluck, is ravaging rice farmers and seriously damaging the economy. I had a long talk with Chareon this morning in his office. What he explained was even worse than what appears in the papers. In retrospect I should have requested to set up a video camera; what he said should be more widely heard. The devastation to that sector is long-term and could take years to regain Thai dominance in rice exports.

An important aspect of the devastation is that the quality of rice also has been damaged, reducing its value. For instance, for various reasons related and unrelated to the scheme, fragrant rice has been losing its fragrance.

Meanwhile, Chareon explained that India and Vietnam have taken the lead, but that India has its own rice scheme that could similarly wreck their progress, while Vietnam is the smartest with its plan.

And so now with millions of tons of rice still sitting in Thai warehouses, the first crop of 2014 is now starting to come in. Chareon’s suggestion was not to worry about the rice in the warehouses at this moment, but to move the new crop out the door and then get back to the stored rice, which he suggested should be used in the domestic market.

I asked if the rice farmers will fight the government if they are not paid. He said they will not fight so much right now because they are in their fields working to bring the first harvest in, which will be over in February. He said that if the farmers decide to do something serious, the post-harvest window of March-April is the most likely window.

I call these “farmers wars” – not that this is a war in Thailand. Farmers wars typically revolve around the crop cycles and seasons. Thailand — the world’s number one rice exporter — produces one-third of the world’s supply.

Source: ATN/Michael Yon

Man arrested for firing shots at protest

A man has been arrested after firing shots during a protest in Kagiso, Krugersdorp, Gauteng police said.

He is accused of discharging a firearm and was taken into custody on Saturday after a protest erupted in the area, said Brigadier Sipho Ngubane.

Kagiso residents took to the streets over the weekend, demanding that mining activities in the area be stopped immediately.

“They were complaining that the mining activities in the area were damaging their houses.”

Most of the roads were still blocked with stones and burnt tyres, although Ngubane said the situation was calm on Monday morning.

He said on Sunday police fired rubber bullets to disperse protesters who were throwing stones.

“A municipal and a police vehicle were badly damaged by stones thrown by protesters.”

No one was arrested on Sunday.

Police would be deployed until the situation returned to normal, said Ngubane.

A meeting between the department of mineral resources and the mining company is scheduled for Tuesday.

Defeated by the Taliban, Washington decides to take on Russia,China

by Paul Craig Roberts

The several days of organized protests in Ukraine are notable for the relative lack of police violence. Unlike in the US, Canada, Thailand, Greece, and Spain, peaceful protesters have not been beaten, tear gassed, water cannoned, and tasered by Ukrainian police. Unlike in Egypt, Palestine, and Bahrain, Ukrainian protesters have not been fired upon with live ammunition. The restraint of the Ukrainian government and police in the face of provocations has been remarkable. Apparently, Ukrainian police have not been militarized by US Homeland Security.

What are the Ukrainian protests about? On the surface, the protests don’t make sense. The Ukrainian government made the correct decision to stay out of the EU. Ukraine’s economic interests lie with Russia, not with the EU. This is completely obvious.

The EU wants Ukraine to join so that Ukraine can be looted, like Latvia, Greece, Spain, Italy, Ireland, and Portugal. The situation is so bad in Greece, for example, that the World Health Organization reports that some Greeks are infecting themselves with HIV in order to receive the 700 euro monthly benefit for the HIV-infected.

The US wants Ukraine to join so it can become a location for more of Washington’s missile bases against Russia.

Why would Ukrainians want to be looted?

Why would Ukrainians want to become targets for Russia’s Iskander Missiles as a host country for Washington’s aggression against Russia?

Why would Ukrainians having gained their sovereignty from Russia want to lose it to the EU?

Obviously, an intelligent, aware, Ukrainian population would not accept these costs of joining the EU.

So, why the protests?

Part of the answer is Ukrainian nationalists’ hatred of Russia. With the Soviet collapse, Ukraine became a country independent of Russia. When empires break up, other interests can seize power. Various secessions occurred producing a collection of small states such as Georgia, Azerbaijan, the former central Asian Soviet Republics, Ukraine, the Baltics, and the pieces into which Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia were broken by “nationalism.” The governments of these weak states were easy for Washington to purchase. The governments of these powerless states are more responsive to Washington than to their own people. Much of the former Soviet Empire is now part of Washington’s Empire. Georgia, the birthplace of Joseph Stalin, now sends its sons to die for Washington in Afghanistan, just as Georgia did for the Soviet Union,

These former constituent elements of the Russian/Soviet Empire are being incorporated into Washington’s Empire. The gullible nationalists, naifs really, in these American colonies might think that they are free, but they simply have exchanged one master for another.

They are blind to their subservience, because they remember their subservience to Russia/Soviet Union and have not yet realized their subservience to Washington, which they see as a liberator with a checkbook. When these weak and powerless new countries, which have no protector, realize that their fate is not in their own hands, but in Washington’s hands, it will be too late for them.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union, Washington quickly stepped into the place of Russia. The new countries were all broke, as was Russia at the time and, thus, helpless. Washington used NGOs funded by Washington and its EU puppets to create anti-Russian, pro-American, pro-EU movements in the former constituent parts of Soviet Russia. The gullible peoples were so happy to have escaped the Soviet thumb that they did not realize that they now had new masters.

It is a good bet that the Ukrainian protests are a CIA organized event, using the Washington and EU funded NGOs and manipulating the hatred of Ukrainian nationalists for Russia. The protests are directed against Russia. If Ukraine can be realigned and brought into the fold of Washington’s Empire, Russia is further diminished as a world power.

To this effect NATO conducted war games against Russia last month in operation Steadfast Jazz 2013. http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2013/10/17/nato-steadfast-jazz-exercise-chill-of-cold-war.html Finland, Ukraine, Georgia, and neutral Sweden have offered their military participation in the next iteration of NATO war games close to Russia’s borders despite the fact that they are not NATO members.

The diminishment of Russia as a powerful state is critical to Washington’s agenda for world hegemony. If Russia can be rendered impotent, Washington’s only concern is China.

The Obama regime’s “Pivot to Asia” announced Washington’s plan to surround China with naval and air bases and to interject Washington into every dispute that China has with Asian neighbors. China has responded to Washington’s provocation by expanding its air space, an action that Washington calls destabilizing when in fact it is Washington that is destabilizing the region.

China is unlikely to be intimidated, but could undermine itself if its economic reform opens China’s economy to western manipulation. Once China frees its currency and embraces “free markets,” Washington can manipulate China’s currency and drive China’s currency into volatility that discourages its use as a rival to the dollar. China is disadvantaged by having so many university graduates from US universities, where they have been indoctrinated with Washington’s view of the world. When these American-programmed graduates return to China, some tend to become a fifth column whose influence will ally with Washington’s war on China.

So where does this leave us? Washington will prevail until the US dollar collapses.

Many support mechanisms are in place for the dollar. The Federal Reserve and its dependent bullion banks have driven down the price of gold and silver by short-selling in the paper futures market, allowing bullion to flow into Asia at bargain prices, but removing the pressure of a rising gold price on the exchange value of the US dollar.

Washington has prevailed on Japan and, apparently, the European Central Bank, to print money in order to prevent the rise of the yen and euro to the dollar.

The Trans-Pacific and Trans-Atlantic Partnerships are designed to keep countries in the US dollar payments system, thus supporting the dollar’s value in currency markets.

Eastern European members of the EU that still have their own currencies have been told that they must print their own currencies in order to prevent a rise in their currency’s value relative to the US dollar that would curtail their exports.

The financial world is under Washington’s thumb. And Washington is printing money for the sake of 4 or 5 mega-banks.

That should tell the protestors in Ukraine all they need to know.

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have attracted a worldwide following. His latest book, The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the West is now available.

Angolan police fire teargas to disperse UNITA protest

Angolan police fired tear gas and warning shots on Saturday to disperse hundreds of opposition supporters demonstrating in the capital against the disappearance and possible murder of two anti-government activists.

The ruling MPLA party this week accused the main UNITA opposition group of promoting “chaos and anarchy” with its plans for nationwide rallies to tap into public anger in Africa’s number two oil producer at the two disappearances.

Prosecutors said last week that Isaias Cassule and Antonio Alves Camulingui, who were involved in organising protests by former presidential guards to demand payment of wage arrears, had been kidnapped and possibly murdered in May 2012.

In the capital, demonstrators were met by phalanxes of heavily armed riot police, some on horseback, who charged the crowds when youths started throwing stones. Former rebel group UNITA lost a 27-year civil war to the MPLA in 2002 and has since been trounced in two elections.

It has long accused President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos of suppressing human rights and using excessive violence to clamp down on dissent during his 34-year rule. The MPLA said dos Santos had ordered an investigation into the disappearances and all those found responsible would be punished.

The MPLA also alleged that UNITA has been inspired by opposition Renamo guerrillas in Mozambique, another former Portuguese African colony, who have staged attacks in recent months after two decades of peace following a devastating 1975-1992 civil war. – Reuters

S. African cabinet condemns protest vandalism

There is no logic in destroying one service in the course of demanding another, Minister in the Presidency Collins Chabane said on Thursday.

Briefing the media following Cabinet’s fortnightly meeting on Wednesday, he said the destruction of private and public property, seen in recent service delivery protests around the country, served nobody’s interests.

“Cabinet condemns the recent spate of violence, destruction of private and public properties, and looting of goods in Gauteng, the Eastern Cape, and Western Cape… [and] commends the police for intervening and quelling the situation.”

The destruction of public property deprived communities of much-needed services.

“Government will not allow criminals to destroy structures and amenities where vital services are rendered. Vandalism helps no one, and there is no logic to destroying one service in the course of demanding another,” he said. – Sapa

French in 17th-century red bonnets destroy ecotax radars

French farmers in Brittany, wearing red bonnets, protest against the Ecotax

The French government scrambled Tuesday to contain anger over a proposed environmental tax as protesters continued to destroy radars set up to help collect the levy, in a revolt that shows no sign of abating.

Protests over the new “ecotax” on trucks, which aims to encourage environmentally friendly commercial transport, kicked off in earnest last month in the northwestern region of Brittany and eventually forced the government to backtrack and suspend the levy.

Wearing red bonnets, the symbol of a 17th-century anti-tax campaign in Brittany, the protesters — small business owners, fishermen and food industry workers — marched in big, sometimes violent, rallies in the region, which has already been crushed by job cuts and would be hard hit by the new tax.

Some destroyed radars set up in advance along roads to screen passing vehicles and determine whether they need to pay the tax, which would apply to French and foreign vehicles carrying goods weighing over 3.5 tonnes.

Under pressure to rein in its state deficit, France’s Socialist government has announced about 3 billion euros ($4.1 billion) in tax increases for next year, and protests in Brittany come on top of wider opposition to tax hikes.

The ecotax was actually adopted by the previous right-wing UMP government in 2009 but its implementation had repeatedly been put off.

And while the Socialist government suspended the levy last week over the unrest, protesters asking for the tax to be completely abandoned have continued to destroy radars, mostly in Brittany but in other parts of the country too.

On Tuesday, the transport ministry said 11 such radars had been vandalised since the beginning of the protest movement, as had four big overhead road structures equipped with cameras and radio receptors.

This equipment would identify trucks liable for the tax thanks to a GPS box installed inside the vehicles.

Controversy has also started to swirl around Ecomouv’, the firm contracted by the previous government to collect the tax, amid “questions” over how the company was awarded the contract.

Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici on Tuesday said the contract signed with the firm — which is majority owned by Italian company Autostrade per l’Italia — would have to be renegotiated.

“We can question the fact that the collection of a national tax was handed over to a supplier with foreign origins,” he said.

And while protests have so far been concentrated in Brittany, there is concern that the unrest may spread to other parts of France.

Last week, market gardeners staged a rally in a region near Brittany to demand an end to the levy, and several ecotax radars have been destroyed in other parts of France. – AFP

South African police handled 12 000 protests

Police handled more than 12,000 public protests during the 2012/2013 financial year, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said on Thursday.

“Over the past four years, a total of 46,180 incidents were attended to and all were successfully stabilised, with 14,843 arrests effected,” he said at the release of the 2012/2013 crime statistics in Pretoria.

These were made up of 41,104 peaceful and 5076 violent protests by the SA Municipal Workers Union, the SA Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union, protests in De Doorns in the Western Cape, Marikana in the North West, and Zamdela in the Free State.

“During 2012/13 alone, police managed 12,399 public incidents. Of these 10,517 were peaceful and 1882 were violent public protests with a total of 693 various criminal cases reported,” Mthethwa said.

“Most of the cases were reported in the Western Cape and North West provinces. Currently, stability has been restored.” – Sapa

Thousands march in Morocco in support of Egyptian Islamists

Around 10,000 people took part in a demonstration in the Moroccan capital, Rabat, on Sunday in support of Islamists in Egypt locked in a deadly showdown with security forces.

The crowd carried banners condemning the police operations that have cost hundreds of lives among demonstrators demanding the reinstatement of Egypt’s army-ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi and posters showing the dead in makeshift morgues in Cairo.

“Soldiers should be carrying out their duty of protecting the nation’s territory instead of killing their own people,” said Driss Leghroudi, a 33-year-old academic.

“History is repeating itself. It happened in Algeria in 1992 (with its civil war) … It’s Saudi Arabia which is behind it” in Egypt, he charged, as the crowd chanted for the expulsion of the Egyptian ambassador to Morocco.

Morocco initially adopted a neutral stand after last month’s toppling of Morsi but the authorities in Rabat have since expressed alarm over the carnage resulting from a security crackdown to remove Morsi’s supporters from the streets.

More than 750 people have been killed in violence across Egypt since Wednesday, official figures show. – AFP