Egyptian Army Evicts Protesters

The Egyptian military forcibly evicted hundreds of protesters from Cairo's Tahrir Square yesterday after dozens of thugs attacked pro-reform demonstrators. Activists seeking to keep up pressure for reform had continued to gather in the square after the ouster of Hosni Mubarak. "It is absolutely unacceptable that the army should participate in violently breaking up the peaceful protests," an Amnesty International director tells al-Jazeera. "It appears that the armed forces are simply continuing the same old tactics of repression."

The clashes in Cairo followed several days of rising tension around Egypt, AP notes. On Tuesday, the deadliest sectarian clashes in several years left 13 people dead in a village south of Cairo after Muslims clashed with Christians, who make up 10% of Egypt's population. A US State Department spokesman condemned the violence. "It's important for Egyptians to remember the sense of unity in Tahrir Square just a few weeks ago and to refrain from any kind of violence—and to go back to that sense of peaceful demonstration and expression," he said. (More Tahrir Square stories.)