Doctors twice use defibrillator on Egypt's Mubarak

In this Saturday, June 2, 2012 file photo, Egypt's ex-President Hosni Mubarak lays on a gurney inside a barred cage in the police academy courthouse in Cairo, Egypt.

CAIRO (AP) -- Doctors used a defibrillator twice on Hosni Mubarak when they could not find a pulse Monday, the latest health crisis for the ousted Egyptian president since he was sentenced to life and moved to a prison hospital nine days ago, security officials said.

The officials said the 84-year-old Mubarak was slipping in and out of consciousness and was being fed liquids intravenously. Mubarak also lost consciousness several times Sunday and officials have said he is suffering from high blood pressure, depression and breathing difficulties.

Mubarak's health scare adds one more layer to Egypt's turbulent political scene with a runoff vote to choose his successor a few days away. His death would bring down the curtain on a chapter of Egypt's modern history that has divided this mainly Muslim nation of 85 million people.

His 29 years in power are the second longest by any Egyptian ruler since the 19th century, when the Ottoman general Mohammed Ali ruled the country for about 44 years ending with his death in 1849. While Mohammed Ali went down in history as the founder of modern Egypt, Mubarak's rule has been defined by corruption, police brutality and the behind-the-scenes rise to power by a coterie of regime-backed businessmen.

More than a year after a popular uprising swept him from office, Mubarak's legacy lives on. The last prime minister to serve under him will go head-to-head in the June 16-17 election against a candidate of the Muslim Brotherhood, the fundamentalist group that Mubarak spent most of his years in power cracking down on.

The candidacy of former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq, like Mubarak a career air force officer, is widely seen as an attempt by the old regime to hang on to power in the face of the revolutionary groups that engineered the uprising and the Brotherhood, whose candidate is U.S.-trained engineer Mohammed Morsi.

Mubarak has been held in the intensive care ward of Torah prison hospital south of Cairo since June 2, when he was convicted of failing to prevent the killing of protesters in the uprising that forced him from office in February 2011. He was sentenced to life in prison.

His two sons, onetime heir apparent Gamal and wealthy businessman Alaa, were at his side, the officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. The sons also are being held at the prison, awaiting trial on insider trading charges after they and their father were acquitted June 2 of corruption charges.

Mubarak's wife, Suzanne, visited him Sunday and, according to the officials, demanded that he be transferred to a better-equipped hospital outside the penal system. The officials said such a transfer was likely unless Mubarak's health improves.

In his last public appearance at his June 2 sentencing, the bedridden Mubarak sat stone-faced in the defendants' cage in the courtroom, his eyes hidden behind dark glasses. Officials said he broke into tears when he learned he was being transferred to a prison. It took officials hours to convince him to leave the helicopter that ferried him from the courthouse to the prison.

Media reports quoted Mubarak at the time as saying the military council who took over after his ouster had deceived him. "Egypt has sold me out. They want me to die here," he reportedly said.

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Egypt soccer violence kills 74, fans turn on army

Egypt soccer violence kills 74

(Reuters) - Seventy-four people were killed when supporters clashed at an Egyptian soccer match, prompting fans and politicians on Thursday to turn on the ruling army for failing to prevent the deadliest incident since Hosni Mubarak was ousted.

At least 1,000 people were injured in the violence on Wednesday when soccer fans invaded the pitch in the Mediterranean city of Port Said, after local team al-Masry beat visitors from Cairo, Al Ahli, Egypt's most successful club.

Angry politicians denounced the lack of security at the match and accused military leaders of allowing, or even causing, the fighting. The Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist group that dominates parliament, saw an "invisible" hand at work.

The city's streets were quiet at dawn, with few police or army officers in sight.

"The military council wants to prove that the country is heading towards chaos and destruction. They are Mubarak's men. They are applying his strategy when he said 'choose me or choose chaos'," said Mahmoud el-Naggar, 30, a laboratory technician and member of the Coalition of the Revolutionary Youth in Port Said.

"Down with military rule," thousands of Egyptians chanted at the main Cairo train station where they met injured fans returning from what one minister said was the scene of Egypt's worst soccer disaster.

Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the state television building and marches across the capital were planned.

Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, 76, who heads the ruling military council, took an unusual step of speaking by telephone to a television channel, the sport broadcaster owned by Al Ahli, vowing to track down the culprits. The army announced three days of national mourning.

"I deeply regret what happened at the football match in Port Said. I offer my condolences to the victims' families," Tantawi said in comments broadcast on state television.

It did little to assuage the anger of fans, who, like many Egyptians, are furious that Egypt is still plagued by lawlessness and frequent bouts of deadly violence almost a year after Mubarak was driven out and replaced by an army council.

As with past flare-ups, it quickly turned political. Parliament will hold an emergency session later on Thursday to discuss the violence.

"The people want the execution of the field marshal," fans chanted at the station. "We will secure their rights, or die like them," they said as covered bodies were unloaded from the trains.

ENRAGED

The post-match pitch invasion provoked panic among the crowd as rival fans fought. Most of the deaths were among people who were trampled in the crush of the panicking crowd or who fell or were thrown from terraces, witnesses and health workers said.

Television footage showed some security officers in the stadium showing no sign of trying to stop the pitch invasion. One officer was filmed as people poured onto the field, talking on a mobile phone.

"The rush caused a stampede, people were pushing each other against the metal door and stepping on each other," said one witness who attended the match, 23-year-old Ossama El-Zayat.

"We saw riot police firing shots in the air, and then everyone got scared and kept pushing against the locked door. We didn't know whether police were firing live rounds or not. People were crying and dying," he said.

Several enraged politicians and ordinary Egyptians accused officials who are still in their jobs after the fall of Mubarak of complicity in the tragedy, or at least of allowing a security vacuum that has let violence flourish in the past 12 months.

"The security forces did this or allowed it to happen. The men of Mubarak are still ruling. The head of the regime has fallen but all his men are still in their positions," Albadry Farghali, a member of parliament for Port Said, screamed in a telephone call to live television.

Some saw the violence as orchestrated to target the "Ultras," Al Ahli's dedicated fans whose experience confronting police at soccer matches was turned with devastating effect against Mubarak's heavy-handed security forces in the uprising.

They played a significant role in defending Cairo's Tahrir Square, the heart of the uprising against Mubarak, when men on camels and horses charged protesters last year. Thursday is the anniversary of the notorious February 2 camel charge.

"All that happened is not for the sake of a game. It's political. It was orchestrated by the military council to target the Ultras," said Abdullah el-Said, a 43-year-old driver in Port Said. "The military council wanted to crush the ultras because they sided with protesters ever since the revolution began."

Yet many Egyptians still see the army as the only guarantor of security. When one activist in group outside a hospital accused the army of sowing chaos, a man chimed in blaming the youths: "Security has to return to the streets. Enough with all those protests that caused this security vacuum," he yelled.

The Brotherhood, whose Freedom and Justice Party won the biggest bloc in parliament, blamed an "invisible" hand for causing the violence and said the authorities were negligent.

"We fear that some officers are punishing the people for their revolution and for depriving them of their ability to act as tyrants and restricting their privileges," it said.

'THUGS'

Others blamed "thugs," the hired hands or plain clothes police officers in Mubarak's era who would often emerge from police lines to crush dissent to his rule.

"Unknown groups came between the fans and they were the ones that started the chaos. I was at the match and I saw that the group that did this is not from Port Said," said Farouk Ibrahim.

"They were thugs, like the thugs the National Democratic Party used in elections," he said, referring to Mubarak's former party and the polls that were routinely rigged in its favor.

The two soccer teams, al-Masry and Al Ahli, have a history of fierce rivalry. Witnesses said fighting began after Ahli fans unfurled banners insulting Port Said and one descended to the pitch carrying an iron bar at the end of the match.

Al-Masry fans poured onto the pitch and attacked Al Ahli players before turning to attack rival supporters.

"I saw people holding machetes and knives. Some were hit with these weapons, other victims were flung from their seats, while the invasion happened," Usama El Tafahni, a journalist in Port Said who attended the match, told Reuters.

Many fans died in a subsequent stampede, while some were flung off their seats onto the pitch and were killed by the fall. At the height of the disturbances, rioting fans fired flares straight into the stands.

Television footage showed fans running onto the field and chasing Al Ahli players. A small group of riot police formed a corridor to protect the players, but they appeared overwhelmed and fans were still able to kick and punch players as they fled.

Hospitals in the Suez Canal zone were put on alert and dozens of ambulances were sent from the cities of Ismailia and Suez, said an official in the zone's local ambulance service.

Tantawi said a fact-finding committee would be set up and pledged that the army's plan to hand over power to civilians would not be derailed. The army has promised to go back to barracks by the end of June after a presidential election.

"Egypt will be stable. We have a roadmap to transfer power to elected civilians. If anyone is plotting instability in Egypt they will not succeed," he told Al Ahli's channel.

Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim said 47 people were arrested. Egypt's football federation said it was indefinitely delaying matches for the Egyptian premier league. Al Ahli club said in a statement it was suspending all sports activities and holding three days of mourning.

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Islamists seen as winners in Egypt election

Vote Counting in Egypt

(Reuters) - Egypt's ruling military painted a dire picture of the economy on Thursday as election officials delayed releasing results of a landmark parliamentary poll that Islamist parties looked set to win, saying votes were still being counted.

They said first-round results would be declared on Friday, a day when youthful protesters demanding an immediate end to army rule have called a rally in Cairo's Tahrir Square to remember the 42 people killed in clashes with riot police last month.

Egyptians voting freely for the first time since army officers ousted the king in 1952 seem willing to give Islamists a chance. "We tried everyone, why not try Sharia (Islamic law) once?" asked Ramadan Abdel Fattah, 48, a bearded civil servant.

Islamist success at the polls in Egypt, the most populous Arab nation, would reinforce a trend in North Africa, where moderate Islamists now lead governments in Morocco and post-uprising Tunisia after election wins in the last two months.

Parliament, whose exact makeup will be clear only after Egypt's staggered voting process ends in January, may challenge the power of the generals who took over in February after a popular uprising toppled Hosni Mubarak, an ex-air force chief.

The army council, under growing pressure to make way for civilian rule, has said it will keep powers to pick or fire a cabinet. But the head of the Muslim Brotherhood's party said this week the majority in parliament should form a government.

The poll results had been expected on Thursday, but some constituencies had not completed their counts.

In an alarming revelation, an army official said foreign reserves would plunge to $15 billion by the end of January, down from the $22 billion reported by the central bank in October.

Mahmoud Nasr, financial assistant to army chief Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, told a news briefing that a widening budget deficit might force a review of costly subsidies, especially on petrol, to save money.

The economic crunch has forced the Egyptian pound to its lowest level in nearly seven years after tourism and foreign investment collapsed in the turmoil since Mubarak's overthrow.

The world is closely watching the election, keen for stability in Egypt, which has a peace treaty with Israel, owns the Suez Canal linking Europe and Asia, and which in Mubarak's time was an ally in countering Islamist militants in the region.

Washington and its European allies have urged the generals to step aside swiftly and make way for civilian rule.

GAINS FOR ISLAMISTS

Western powers are coming to accept that the advent of democracy in the Arab world may bring Islamists to power, but they also worry that Islamist rule in Egypt might erode social freedoms and threaten Cairo's 1979 peace treaty with Israel.

The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's oldest Islamist group, says its new Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) is set to win about 40 percent of seats allocated to party lists in this week's vote, which passed off peacefully, albeit with many irregularities.

FJP officials say the party also leads the race for individual seats that make up a third of the total in the poll.

Al-Nour Party, one of several newly formed ultra-conservative Salafi Islamist groups, said on Thursday that it expects to pick up 20 percent of assembly seats overall.

"In light of the media campaign against us, we believe our results are largely acceptable," said Youssry Hamad, Nour's spokesman. "We are doing as well as the Muslim Brotherhood."

The liberal multi-party Egyptian Bloc has said it is on track to secure about a fifth of votes for party lists.

"For the first time in Egypt we don't see a political intention by the state to forge the elections," said Magdy Abdel Halim, coordinator of an EU-backed group of election monitors.

He said the infractions observed did not affect the legitimacy of a vote held in a "reasonably fair atmosphere."

Egypt's April 6 youth movement, a prime mover in the revolt against Mubarak, said an Islamist win should not cause concern.

"No one should worry about the victory of one list or political current. This is democracy and this great nation will not allow anyone to exploit it again," its Facebook page said.

If the FJP and Nour secure the number of seats they expect, they could combine to form a solid majority bloc, although it is far from certain the Brotherhood would want such an alliance.

Senior FJP official Essam el-Erian said before the vote that

Salafis, who had kept a low profile and shunned politics during Mubarak's 30-year rule, would be "a burden for any coalition."

The FJP might seek other partners, such as the liberal Wafd or the moderate Islamist Wasat Party, set up by ex-Brotherhood members in 1996, although only licensed after Mubarak's fall.

Nour Party spokesman Hamad said solving Egypt's problems might be beyond one party. "We believe a coalition government that comprises all political streams is the best option. The burden is too much after all these years of corruption."

PERILS OF DEMOCRACY

Some Egyptians fear the Muslim Brotherhood might try to impose Islamic curbs on a tourism-dependent country whose 80 million people include a 10 percent Coptic Christian minority.

Ali Khafagi, the leader of the FJP's youth committee, said the Brotherhood's goal was to end corruption and revive the economy. Only a "mad group" would try to ban alcohol or force women to wear headscarves, he said.

The priority of the Brotherhood, which gained trust by aiding the poor under Mubarak, is likely to be economic growth to ease poverty and convince voters they are fit to govern.

Essam Sharaf's outgoing government quit during protests against army rule last month in which 42 people were killed, most near Cairo's Tahrir Square, hub of the anti-Mubarak revolt.

Kamal al-Ganzouri, asked by the army to form a "national salvation government," aims to complete the task in the next day or two, but acknowledged on Wednesday that five presidential candidates had turned down invitations to join his cabinet.

Protesters who returned to Tahrir last month, angered by the military's apparent reluctance to cede power, say the generals should step aside now, instead of appointing a man of the past like Ganzouri, 78, who was a premier for Mubarak in the 1990s.

Mohamed Taha, 46, an accountant who supports the liberal Egyptian Bloc, said the election showed that young activists had failed to present a viable program. "Their revolution was stolen and they are stuck searching for who stole it," he said.

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