Cairo
Dozens of wounded file into a makeshift hospital tucked between buildings on Tahrir Square, the symbolic heart of Egypt’s five-month old revolution. They were coming from the scene of clashes between protesters and police that began in the twilight hours of Tuesday, and underscore the volatility of Egypt’s security situation in the nation’s transitional period.
“We just want to live in peace,” says Mahmoud Mohammad, a 15-year-old protester who was injured by rubber bullets in the clashes; he was one of several young men being bandaged up. Among other points of contention that include slow reform, the protesters called for faster prosecutions of the police who killed hundreds of demonstrators earlier this year and speedier trials of former corrupt officials, including former President Hosni Mubarak and former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly.
The speed with which a small protest snowballed into rioting and hours of clashes with the police, is a reminder of the potential for even greater volatility as Egypt's ongoing transition grinds forward. Security services used to violently suppressing dissent remain on the streets and some Egyptians are furious at the history of state torture and violence.
“If you have slow justice, people get angry – slow justice is injustice,” says a volunteer doctor who gave her name as Dina, just before she ran to a patient. The middle-aged man breathed in remnants of tear gas that lingered in downtown’s air.
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