Striking workers attack police in Egypt in price protests

Thousands of demonstrators angry about rising prices and stagnant salaries torched government buildings, looted shops and hurled bricks at police in a gritty industrial town as Egyptians defied government warnings and staged a nationwide strike.

About 150 people were arrested and 80 wounded in the Nile Delta town of Mahalla el-Kobra, where riots raged through the night among residents and disgruntled workers at the largest textile factory in Egypt.

Overnight, protesters stormed the city hall, smashed chairs through shop windows and ran off with computers. They burned tyres and furniture in the streets and at least two schools were set ablaze and the fronts of several banks were vandalised, police said.

Thousands of Egyptian officers chased rioters through the streets and amassed around Mahalla, 75 miles north of Cairo.

Nearly 100 others were arrested earlier elsewhere across Egypt, officials said, as thousands skipped work and school and hundreds protested over the rising cost of food and deteriorating working conditions.

A call for a nationwide strike yesterday was the first major attempt by opposition groups to turn the past year’s labour unrest into a wider political protest against the government of President Hosni Mubarak.

The strike and riots up north came only two days before key elections for local councils, causing jitters in the government, which last week lifted import duties on some food items in an effort to soften economic discontent.

The US-backed government also strongly warned citizens against participating in the strikes and demonstrations. Strikes and demonstrations are illegal in Egypt under the country’s emergency law, and protesters are often detained by Egyptian security forces.

Nearly 40% Egypt’s 76 million people live below or near the poverty line of £1.05p a day. The prices of staples such as cooking oil and rice have nearly doubled in recent months, amid widespread shortages of government-subsidised bread.

Many Egyptians in Cairo responded to the calls for nationwide action by skipping work or school. Many shops were closed in the capital, and traffic was significantly lighter than usual in the normally car-clogged streets.

In an effort to thwart mass protests downtown, the government sent hordes of riot police to many of Cairo’s main squares to intimidate people from showing up.

But there were some smaller protests. Hundreds of students gathered at two universities, chanting anti-government slogans, and activists outside Egypt’s Bar Association waved banners demanding economic reform.

“The strike is legitimate against poverty and starvation,” chanted the protesters, who were surrounded by riot police. Protesters on a roof later showered security forces with glass bottles and bits of wood.

In Mahalla, workers at the Misr Spinning and Weaving Factory initially planned to stage a sit-in at the mill, which employs 25,000 people. But that was cancelled after hundreds of security forces arrived and union leaders said the government promised to pass a law raising the minimum age.

Disgruntled workers and younger activists unhappy with the decision instead held a protest in the main town square later that turned violent .

An Egyptian security official said the 2,000 protesters damaged property and hurled bricks, forcing police to disperse them with tear gas. About 50 were wounded in the riots, he said.

“A lot of young kids and women took part, and actually a few of the women were quite militant and urging people to get into the middle of it,” said Joel Beinin, an expert on union movements at the American University in Cairo.