CAIRO: Egypt’s interior minister has ordered Cairo’s Tora prison hospital to make preparations to receive former President Hosni Mubarak, who has till now been held in a military hospital while he has been standing trial, Al Jazeera television said on Sunday.
Al Jazeera did not cite a source for the report that was carried in a brief headline. The army had no immediate comment on the report.
Earlier Sunday Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim had issued a decision to move members of the former regime to five separate prisons, according to a statement by Cabinet.
These were among several measures proposed by the People’s Assembly’s youth and security and defense committees in a joint meeting held Saturday.
The committees devised several proposals to be raised during Monday’s general session after they met to discuss the investigations into the Port Said massacre and the ongoing clashes between protesters and security forces at the Ministry of Interior.
The youth and security and defense committees agreed that security forces should build a cement wall or “red line” meters away from the ministry.
MP Mohamed El-Beltagy strongly denied rumors that the defense and security committee proposed that security forces shoot protesters who come close to the Ministry of Interior.
“We have urged them [security forces] to immediately stop the use of tear gas and rubber bullets against the protesters,” he said, adding that “We only condone measures that are in line with human rights standards.”
According to MP Faragallah Gadallah from the Building and Development Party, several measures should be taken including moving officials of the former regime to different prisons and dismissing the Prosecutor General Abdel Meguid Mahmoud.
El-Beltagy explained that separating them is crucial as well as transferring ousted president Hosni Mubarak to Tora prison, in addition to Abdel Meguid’s dismissal due to the “mock” investigations of many incidents of deadly violence cases such as the Maspero, Mohamed Mahmoud and Cabinet clashes.
The two committees also decided to leave the case of the Port Said massacre to the fact finding committee, which headed to Port Said on the weekend and will be presenting its report within a week.
On Saturday evening, youth revolutionary movements such as the Revolution Youth Coalition, April 6 Youth Movement, Ultras Ahlawy and Masrena Movement, attended a meeting with the PA’s youth committee.
They called for stripping the government of confidence and forming a national salvation government.
Activist and blogger Ramy Yaacoub, who attended the meeting as an observer, said via his Twitter account that the youth present lashed out at the MPs and the PA for not taking radical action after the Port Said massacre.
Ultras Ahlawy representatives listed three accomplices in the massacre; the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), the Ministry of Interior and the Port Said fans. Ultras co-founder, Ahmed Idris, said “We were warned on our way to [Port Said] that will be slaughtered once we get there.”
By press time, the PA’s general committee was still in session discussing the Port Said massacre, according to its member Margaret Azer, an MP with the liberal Al-Wafd party.
The committee includes parliament speaker Saad El-Katatny, and the two deputies and heads of party blocs, as well as five members: Mostafa Bakry for the independents, Waheed Abdel Meguid, FJP’s El-Beltagi and Al-Nour’s Younis Abdel Hamid.
