Egypt's Students Protest Against Emergency Laws

Thousands of students across Egypt demonstrated on campuses yesterday, calling for political reform and an end to the country's emergency laws.

The protests were confined to university grounds because Egypt's state of emergency - in force for the past 24 years - forbids public gatherings of more than five people without government permission.

About 2,000 students staged an angry protest at Assiut in southern Egypt to mark what the organisers called "the day of freedom in Egypt's universities".

"We called for these demonstrations so the political leadership realises that the youth is in dire need of freedom," student spokesman Karim Farahat said in a statement.

The protesters chanted many of the slogans of the emerging Kifaya (Enough) movement, which seeks to end the rule of the president, Hosni Mubarak, and opposes a succession by his son, Gamal.

Mr Mubarak, who will be 77 next month and has had several recent health scares, is expected to seek a fifth six-year presidential term in October. He was due to be re-elected in a referendum but, amid growing controversy, has agreed to let other candidates stand against him.

More than 1,000 people from Assiut city, 200 miles south of Cairo, gathered for a silent protest in a street after police refused them permission to hold a demonstration.

A security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Associated Press this was because of a "sensitive situation".

About 1,200 students demonstrated at Ain Shams University in Cairo, also calling for constitutional reforms and an end to emergency laws. "No restrictions on political freedoms," they chanted.

One student blamed last week's suicide bombing in Cairo on the bomber's disillusionment with the government. The alleged bomber, Hassan Bashandi, was an engineering student at Zagazig University, 50 miles north-east of Cairo.

At Cairo University yesterday, at least 1,500 students gathered inside the campus, demanding reform of university rules, which they say restrict students' freedom. They also denounced the presence of security forces inside the university, and shouted "No to inheriting power", a reference to the apparent grooming of the president's son.

"Mr President, our country is a republic, not a monarchy," chanted students at Mansoura University, in the Nile delta area.

Egypt's National Council for Human Rights called for the abolition of emergency laws in its annual report, published on Monday.

It also recommended the release of all detainees held without charges - estimated at 16,000 - and said it was "routine practice" for police to make indiscriminate arrests at the scene of a crime and to torture detainees.