Egypt jubilant as Mubarak resigns

Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak has resigned as president and handed control to the military after 18 days of pro-democracy demonstrations.

Several hundred thousand protesters massed in Cairo’s central Tahrir Square, exploded into joy waving Egyptian flags.

US President Barack Obama welcomed the peaceful transition of power, saying: “The people of Egypt have spoken. Their voices have been heard. And Egypt will never be the same,” he said.

In brief remarks at the White House, the president noted that it was “not the end of Egypt’s transition, it’s a beginning”. He said that many important questions remain to be resolved and difficult times lie ahead.

“I’m confident the people of Egypt can find the answers,” Mr Obama said. He spoke hours after Mubarak stepped aside, turning authority over to the military.

Mr Obama said: “Egyptians have inspired us, and they’ve done so by putting the lie to the idea that justice is best gained by violence.”

“For Egypt, it was the moral force of non-violence, not terrorism, not mindless killing, but non-violence, moral force, that bent the arc of history.”

Mr Obama singled out the military for praise, saying it helpfully as a “caretaker” in defusing the situation and securing the country.

In Cairo the crowds outside Mubarak’s presidential palace chanted: “The people ousted the president”.

Car horns and celebratory shots in the air were heard around the city of 18 million after Vice President Omar Suleiman made the announcement on national TV just after nightfall.

Mubarak had sought to cling to power, handing some of his powers to Suleiman while keeping his title.

But an explosion of protests today rejecting the move appeared to have pushed the military into forcing him out completely.

Hundreds of thousands marched throughout the day in cities across the country as soldiers stood by, besieging his palace in Cairo and Alexandria and the state TV building.

“In these grave circumstances that the country is passing through, President Hosni Mubarak has decided to leave his position as president of the republic,” a grim-looking Suleiman said.

“He has mandated the Armed Forces Supreme Council to run the state. God is our protector and succour.”

Nobel Peace prize winner Mohammed ElBaradei, whose young supporters were among the organisers of the protest movement, told The Associated Press: “This is the greatest day of my life.

“The country has been liberated after decades of repression,” he said, adding that he expects a “beautiful” transition of power.

Neighbouring Israel watched with the crisis with unease, worried that their 1979 peace treaty could be in danger. It quickly demanded that post-Mubarak Egypt continue to adhere to it.

Any break seems unlikely in the near term – the military leadership supports the treaty. While anti-Israeli feeling is strong among Egyptians and future ties may be strained, few call for outright abrogating a treaty that has kept peace after three wars in the past half-century.

From the oil-rich Gulf states in the east to Morocco in the west, regimes both pro- and anti-US could not help but worry they could see a similar upheaval.

Several of the region’s authoritarian rulers have made gestures of democratic reform to avert their own protest movements.

Mubarak himself flew to his isolated palace in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, 250 miles from the turmoil in Cairo.

The question now turned to what happens next after effectively a military coup, albeit one prompted by overwhelming popular pressure. Protesters had overtly pleaded for the army to oust Mubarak.

The country is now ruled by the Armed Forces Supreme Council, the military’s top body consisting of its highest ranking generals and headed by defence minister Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi.

After Mubarak’s resignation, a military spokesman appeared on state TV and promised the army would not act as a substitute for a government based on the “legitimacy of the people”.

He said the military was preparing the next steps needed “to achieve the ambitions of our great nation” and would announce them soon. He praised Mubarak for his contributions to the country, then expressed the military’s condolences for protesters killed in the unrest, standing at attention to give a salute.