A wounded father figure
CAIRO–The chants of "down with the regime" started up again about 30 seconds after President Hosni Mubarak had wrapped up his speech on Tuesday night, where he announced that he would leave the world stage and forgo running for a sixth term this fall. For the thousands of protesters spending the night in Tahrir Square ...
CAIRO–The chants of "down with the regime" started up again about 30 seconds after President Hosni Mubarak had wrapped up his speech on Tuesday night, where he announced that he would leave the world stage and forgo running for a sixth term this fall. For the thousands of protesters spending the night in Tahrir Square -- who watched the speech live projected on a huge makeshift screen -- the message couldn't have been clearer. Mubarak's latest fallback concession would not be acceptable.
CAIRO–The chants of "down with the regime" started up again about 30 seconds after President Hosni Mubarak had wrapped up his speech on Tuesday night, where he announced that he would leave the world stage and forgo running for a sixth term this fall. For the thousands of protesters spending the night in Tahrir Square — who watched the speech live projected on a huge makeshift screen — the message couldn’t have been clearer. Mubarak’s latest fallback concession would not be acceptable.
"It’s a political game, he’s buying time," said Khaled Maghrabi, 46, an executive at a drug company who had taken to the streets on Friday. All through the square on a chilly night, protesters showed no signs of abandoning their historic protest campaign or turning down the pressure on the 82-year old president. In the past week, Mubarak has dissolved the cabinet, appointed his first-ever vice president, and reached out urgently for dialogue with the opposition. But each new half-concession has only served to motivate and enrage the protesters further.
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