Egypt upheaval goes on with 1,000 hurt in anti-police protests

Egyptian security forces clashed for a second day yesterday in Cairo with hundreds of youths demanding that the country's military rulers speed up prosecution of police officers accused of brutality during mass protests that forced Hosni Mubarak to step down.

More than 1,000 people have so far been injured, assistant health minister Abdul-Hameed Abazah said.

In scenes reminiscent of the 18-day uprising that removed Mr Mubarak on 11 February, riot police deployed around the interior ministry building and fired in the air or used tear gas as demonstrators threw rocks and petrol bombs.

By late afternoon, troops backed by armoured vehicles took over from riot police who had been protecting the interior ministry, closing all roads leading to the complex.

The protests attest to the ongoing upheaval in Egypt nearly five months after Mr Mubarak stepped down. The country is struggling with a worsening economic crisis and with a security vacuum that has led to a surge in crime.

The question of meting out justice to those responsible for the deaths of some 850 protesters during the uprising, as well as for regime stalwarts charged with corruption, is among the most divisive in post-Mubarak Egypt. Many of those who took part in the uprising accuse the ruling military of showing too much reverence to key figures of the old regime and lenience with senior police commanders accused of ordering the killing of protesters.

The military issued a statement on its Facebook page claiming the clashes were designed to "destabilise the country" and drive a wedge between the groups behind the uprising and the security forces.

The main chant back in January and February was "The people want the fall of the regime." But that has been replaced by screams of: "The people want the fall of the field-marshal" - a reference to Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, for years Mr Mubarak's defence minister and chairman of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces that has taken over. Some of the youth groups behind the uprising see Mr Tantawi as tainted because he was a key member of the Mubarak regime.

Critics also charge that Mr Tantawi's policies are designed to keep the old order, and accuse him of deliberately stalling the process of purging Mubarak loyalists and failing to reform the hated interior ministry and its security agencies.