Reform leader tells Mubarak to quit

EGYPT’S most prominent reform advocate called yesterday for President Hosni Mubarak to resign after the powerful military stepped up its presence across the anarchic capital, closing roads with tanks and sending F-16 fighter jets streaking over downtown.

The army’s show of force appeared aimed at quelling looting, armed robbery and arson that broke out alongside pro-democracy protests and have turned the cultural heart of the Arab world into a tableau of once-unimaginable scenes of chaos.

The military made no attempt to disperse some 5,000 protesters gathered at Tahrir Square, a plaza in the heart of downtown that protesters have occupied since Friday afternoon.

They have violated the curfew to call for an end to President Hosni Mubarak’s regime, which they blame for poverty, unemployment, widespread corruption and police brutality.

Nobel Peace laureate Mohamed El Baradei appeared in the square at 7pm “You are the owners of this revolution. You are the future,” he told the cheering crowd.

“Our essential demand is the departure of the regime and the beginning of a new Egypt in which each Egyptian lives in virtue, freedom and dignity.”

One of the senior leaders of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, which wants to establish an islamist state in the Arab world’s most populous nation, said he was heading to Tahrir, or Liberation, Square to meet with other opposition leaders.

“You can call this a revolution, you can call this an uprising,” Essam el-Erian said.

Crowds of foreigners filled Cairo International Airport, desperate and unable to leave because dozens of flights were cancelled and delayed.

Gangs of armed men attacked at least four jails across Egypt before dawn, helping to free hundreds of Muslim militants and thousands of other inmates. Young men with guns and large sticks smashed cars and robbed people in Cairo.

The official death toll from five days of growing crisis stood at 97, with thousands injured, but reports from witnesses across the country indicated that the actual toll was far higher.

Banks were closed on orders from Egypt’s Central Bank, and the country’s stockmarket was shut on what is normally the first day of the trading week.

An unprecedented internet cutoff remained in place for a third day. Egyptian mobile phone networks were back up but with text messaging widely disrupted.

The US embassy in Cairo told its citizens in Egypt to consider leaving the country, and said it had authorised the voluntary departure of dependents and non-emergency employees, a display of Washington’s escalating concern about the stability of its closest Arab ally.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton appealed for an orderly transition to democracy in Egypt, saying the US expects the protests will lead to free and fair elections.

Israel’s prime minister told his cabinet that he was “anxiously following” the crisis, saying in his first public comments on the situation that Israel’s three- decade-old peace agreement with Egypt must be preserved.

Minutes before the start of a 4pm curfew, at least two jets roared over the Nile and toward Tahrir Square.