CAIRO, Egypt — (DMN/Al-Jazeera) – Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, 84, was declared clinically dead shortly after arriving at a military hospital in Cairo, where he was taken after suffering a stroke and cardiac arrest, medical sources told the state-run Mena News Agency. Official reports of the stroke and cardiac arrest came earlier Tuesday. Adel Saeed, spokesman of the Egyptian prosecutor, had told CNN that Mubarak’s heart had stopped, and that personnel revived him with “electric shocks and CPR.” State-run Nile TV reported that Mubarak suffered a stroke. Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison June 2 for the killing of pro-democracy demonstrators last year. He already was suffering from health problems and attended court on a gurney.
At the scene
Jon Leyne BBC News, Cairo
By early evening, the crowds of protesters were beginning to edge out the traffic from Tahrir Square. Organisers drew barricades across the entrances. Egyptian flag sellers took up position, and the chants began. “Down with the military,” went one. “Wake up field marshal, this is the last day,” went another – a reference to the promise by the military ruler Field Marshal Tantawi to hand over power to civilians by the end of June. Then the most familiar cry of all: “Erhal” (meaning simply “leave”!).
As the sun began to set, a series of marches converged on the square. One man rallied protesters with a drum adorned with a picture of the Muslim Brotherhood leader, Mohammed Mursi. Any demonstration organised by the Muslim Brotherhood is almost guaranteed a strong turnout. The question now is how determined they are to challenge the latest moves by the military to take back sweeping powers, or would victory in the presidential elections be enough to satisfy them.
Thousands of Egyptians have packed into Cairo’s Tahrir Square to protest against the ruling military council’s decision to claim new powers, amid contesting claims by both presidential candidates of victory in the weekend’s election. In the hub of the uprising that deposed president Hosni Mubarak, protesters chanted against his military successors, with a steady trickle of people joining the demonstration after sunset. The demonstration comes against a backdrop of uncertainty over the winner of the presidential vote, with the Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi and his rival, former prime minister Ahmed Shafik, both claiming victory.
Earlier on Tuesday, a campaign spokesman for Shafik said he had won the presidential election, countering the Muslim Brotherhood’s claims that its candidate was the winner. Ahmed Sarhan told a televised news conference in Cairo that Shafik won 51.5 per cent of the vote and dismissed the claim of victory by Morsi’s campaign as “false”. “General Ahmed Shafik is the next president of Egypt,” said Sarhan, adding that the candidate won some 500,000 votes more than Morsi. Al Jazeera’s Mike Hanna, reporting from Cairo, said the claims did not come as a surprise. “What we have at the moment is both sides claiming they have won, and both sides are using exactly the same figures,” he said. Against this backdrop of conflicting victory claims, thousands of protesters began to gather following afternoon prayers in central Cairo’s Tahrir Square.
Led by the Muslim Brotherhood, participants in Tahrir Square rally chanted “Down with military rule”. The opposition April 6 Youth Movement had called on its supporters to join the protests. Hundreds more protested in front of the parliament building, a few hundred metres away from Tahrir Square, against a decree by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) dissolving the Islamist-led parliament, following a constitutional court ruling last week which found the legislature to be unconstitutional.
The Brotherhood was present in strength in the protests, called by several groups which had participated in Egypt’s 2011 uprising, against measures by the ruling military council to claim sweeping powers. “The dissolution of the parliament is null and void, the military council must leave and now legitimacy lies with the people who elected Morsi,” said Abdel Basset Mohieddine, a Brotherhood support taking part in the protest. The SCAF declaration also grants it veto power over the wording of a new permanent constitution and appeared to interfere with the ability of the incoming president to exercise his powers.
With official results in the presidential poll, the first since the uprising that removed Hosni Mubarak, not expected before Thursday, both camps claimed victory for their candidates. At a news conference earlier on Tuesday, Morsi’s campaign released what they said were the certified figures transmitted by election officials to the electoral commission, which they said showed their candidate taking 52 per cent of the vote. Egyptian state media reported that counts showed Morsi ahead. “After the counting was finished in all of Egypt’s 27 provinces, indications show that Mohammed Morsi has won 51 per cent and Ahmed Shafik won 49 per cent,” the state-owned Al-Ahram newspaper said on its website.
A confirmed win for Morsi would mark the first time the Islamists had taken the presidency of the Arab world’s most populous nation. After campaign officials announced his projected victory on Sunday, there were scenes of jubilation at Morsi’s Cairo headquarters from where the candidate pledged to work “hand-in-hand with all Egyptians for a better future, freedom, democracy, development and peace”. “We are not seeking vengeance or to settle accounts,” he said, adding that he would build a “modern, democratic state” for all Egyptians, Muslims and Christians alike.
