Tara Todras-Whitehill for The New York Times
An Egyptian man threw a tear-gas canister back at the police in Port Said on Sunday.
PORT SAID, Egypt — Large protests in the Suez Canal city of Port Said and fresh clashes in Cairo on Monday marked a fifth day of widening unrest in Egypt, a day after President Mohamed Morsi declared a state of emergency and a curfew in three major cities as escalating violence in the streets threatened his government and Egypt’s democracy.
In Port Said, where the police lost control at the weekend and where marchers on Monday said they no longer recognized Mr. Morsi’s authority, protesters chased away armored personnel carriers with rocks and shoes during funeral procession for victims of the recent violence. Protesters also called for the entire city to ignore the 9 p.m. curfew.
In the capital, Cairo, police fired tear gas at protesters at the foot of the Kasr el-Nile bridge, the scene of an epic battle during the uprising against former President Hosni Mubarak exactly two years ago, on what was known as the “Day of Rage.” Opposition groups have called for protests to commemorate the anniversary on Monday.
By imposing a one-month state of emergency in Suez, Ismailia and Port Said, Mr. Morsi’s declaration deployed one of the most despised weapons of former Mr. Mubarak’s autocracy. Under Mubarak-era laws left in effect by the country’s new Constitution, a state of emergency suspends the ordinary judicial process and most civil rights. It gives the president and the police extraordinary powers. On Sunday, riot police officers took up positions near Cairo’s Tahrir Square.
Mr. Morsi, Egypt’s first freely elected president and a leader of the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, took the step after four days of clashes in Cairo and in cities around the country between the police and protesters denouncing his government. Most of the protests were set off by the second anniversary of the popular revolt that ousted Mr. Mubarak, which fell on Friday.
In Port Said, the trouble started over death sentences that a court imposed on 21 local soccer fans for their role in a deadly riot. But after 30 people died in clashes on Saturday — most of them shot by the police — the protesters turned their ire on Mr. Morsi as well the court. Police officers crouching on the roofs of their stations fired tear gas and live ammunition into attacking mobs, and hospital officials said that on Sunday at least seven more people died.
News reports on Monday put the overall death toll from five days of protests at over 50.
Tens of thousands of people marched through the streets of Port Said on Sunday demanding independence from the rest of Egypt. “The people want the state of Port Said,” they chanted in anger at Cairo.
The emergency declaration covers the three cities and their surrounding provinces, all on the economically vital Suez Canal. Mr. Morsi announced the emergency measures in a stern, finger-waving speech on state television on Sunday evening. He said he was acting “to stop the blood bath” and called the violence in the streets “the counterrevolution itself.”
“There is no room for hesitation, so that everybody knows the institution of the state is capable of protecting the citizens,” he said. “If I see that the homeland and its children are in danger, I will be forced to do more than that. For the sake of Egypt, I will.”
Mr. Morsi’s resort to the authoritarian measures of his predecessor appeared to reflect mounting doubts about the viability of Egypt’s central government. After decades of corruption, cronyism and brutality under Mr. Mubarak, Egyptians have struggled to adjust to resolving their differences — whether over matters of political ideology or crime and punishment — through peaceful democratic channels.
“Why are we unable to sort out these disputes?” asked Moattaz Abdel-Fattah, a political scientist and academic who was a member of the assembly that drafted Egypt’s new Constitution. “How many times are we going to return to the state of Egyptians killing Egyptians?” He added: “Hopefully, when you have a genuine democratic machine, people will start to adapt culturally. But we need to do something about our culture.”
Protests Grow on Fifth Day of Unrest in Egypt
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Protests Grow on Fifth Day of Unrest in Egypt
