Five year anniversary of Egyptian revolution

There is little trace of the revolution that swept an autocrat from power five years ago, and Egypt’s latest strongman is keen to keep it that way, reports the BBC’s Orla Guerin in Cairo.

They also boosted security around police stations which were targeted by protesters during the 2011 uprising and which have also been attacked by militants in a growing jihadist insurgency.

Egyptian police stand guard a day ahead of the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 25, 2011 uprising in Tahrir Square, Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, Jan. 24, 2016.

Egypt is marking the fifth anniversary of the 2011 popular uprising that led to the overthrow of former dictator Hosni Mubarak amid beefed up security measures and a fresh spate of arrests and checks in the capital, Cairo.

Police are deployed near Tahrir Square, the symbolic centre of the uprising.

Speaking at Cairo’s Police Academy, Sisi said the police are fighting extremism and “evil” alongside the country’s armed forces and partnering with Egypt’s new parliament in a mission to establish stability and put the economy back on track. Egyptians under his rule, he boasted, were building a “modern” state that upholds the values of democracy and freedom.

Liberal and leftist activists, some of whom had supported Sisi’s move to depose the Brotherhood, soon found themselves on the wrong side of the new authorities, which now flag protests against Mursi that began on June 30 as the real revolution.

“The human rights situation is worse than what it was under the Muslim Brotherhood or Mubarak or SCAF”, he said, referring to the military junta that ruled Egypt in the aftermath of Mubarak’s ouster.

“I do not interfere in the domestic affairs of our brothers in Tunisia, but I tell all Tunisian people that the economic conditions are very hard in the whole world”, Sisi said in his statement aired on the Egyptian state TV on the occasion of the Egyptian national Police Day.

Last week police arrested three administrators of Facebook pages allegedly promoting anti-government protests on the anniversary of the January 25 uprising and the official Middle East News agency claimed all suspects had ties to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.

He awarded medals to the families of almost 40 policemen killed in militant attacks, including eight generals.

On Sunday, however, he paid tribute to the 2011 uprising and the almost 900 protesters killed during the revolt.

“I have nothing to say: no hopes, no dreams, no fears, no warnings, no insights, nothing, absolutely nothing”, Alaa Abdel Fattah, who is serving a five-year sentence for taking part in a small protest, wrote in the British Guardian newspaper.