17.00
We’re coming to the end of our live coverage, though we will of course be immediately posting any major developments as they happen from Egypt. By all accounts, tomorrow – with one million people expected to march on the streets on Cairo – is going to be a crucial 24 hours for the future of the country.
16.31
Qatar-based satellite channel Al Jazeera has said five of its English service journalists were detained in Egypt on Monday, a day after the news network was told to shut down its operations in the country.
Al Jazeera, which also saw its signal to some parts of the Middle East cut on Sunday, reported the arrests in Cairo in a news alert on its Arabic channel.
16.23
Google have now confirmed that Wael Ghonim is missing.
16.16
Several claims on Twitter that Google’s Head of Marketing in the Middle East Wael Ghonim has been missing in Egypt since Jan 25. We are unable to confirm this, though it is being widely reported on various blogs.
16.10
Ships are passing normally and without delay through the Suez Canal, even as protests in Egypt continued for a seventh day, the head of traffic for the waterway’s operator has told Bloomberg.
The canal is handling 45 to 50 vessels a day, a volume that Ahmed El Manakhly of the Suez Canal Authority described as “normal.”
El Manakhly denied an Al-Arabiya report that some canal workers had been asked to go home. He said employees of the authority have been leaving work early to comply with an official curfew from 3 p.m. to 8 a.m., local time.
More than 4 million barrels a day of crude oil, or 4.5 percent of global output, are shipped through the canal or the Sumed pipeline that runs adjacent to it, according to New York- based McQuilling Services. The world’s longest man-made waterway, at 120 miles (190 kilometers), the canal is the fastest passage from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean.
16.00
OPEC won’t be boosting output to cool prices, at least not just yet, according to its Secretary General Abdullah al-Badri. He has just been talking to reporters in London, saying he did not at this stage think it was necessary to call a meeting before its next planned gathering in June – but added that the mood was changing due to the situation in Egypt.
“Before the Tunisian and the Egyptian crisis, we don’t see it (an extraordinary meeting). But now, I don’t know if this crisis will escalate. I hope not,” he told Reuters.
15.36
Fadi Ghandour, boss of one of the world’s biggest logistics companies Aramex, has just been talking about the crisis – some of his operations in Egypt have been temporarily halted.
“Our employees, who are our highest priority, remain safe, and our facilities have not suffered any damage. In the short term, we do not anticipate that the current unrest will have a significant impact on our revenues,” he said.
Aramex shares are actually up 0.49% so far today, so the market seems to agree with him.
15.22
Former British Prime Minister and now MidEast peace envoy Tony Blair is doing the rounds on television and radio, popping up on the BBC and CNN in the past hour.
Interestingly, Blair is in little doubt that change is coming to the country – but also pointing out that President Mubarak is no Saddam Hussein.
‘People want change but they don’t want chaos. There’s going to be change – there’s no doubt about that ,” he told the BBC, adding: ‘Hosni Mubarak is not Saddam Hussein’ . Blair added that Mubarak had done ‘an immense amount’ for the Middle East peace process.
15.10
We reported this morning that the situation was getting worse by the hour in Alexandria. Right now Al Arabiya Television is reporting that the port has been closed. Meanwhile around 1000 people are now gathered in the Cairo district of Shubra, around 2km from Tahrir Square. They arrived soon after mid day prayers are chanting loudly.
14.32
Nobody – at least so far – is getting over worried about the impact on financial markets in the region. Despite huge drops yesterday, one exception was the Saudi Tadawul which rose 2.5%. By 1.20pm today it has slipped 1.86% – not a huge amount over the past 48 hours. Many experts are pointing out that the rising oil prices (they rose over 4% on Friday) are good for many Saudi companies.
And in turn, a strong Saudi market can only be good news for the rest of the GCC.
14.12
The Dubai Financial Market is recovering after a rocky start, now showing a 0.56% fall on the day so far. 15 stocks are down, 7 up and 2 unchanged. Emaar is the most traded, down 1.93% while Depa Interiors is one of the biggest fallers (though listed on Nasdaq Dubai), having slumped 5.48%. Worth noting that Depa won a big contract last month to fit out the Sheraton Heliopolis Hotel in Cairo.
Depa has in the past been very active in Egypt, working on the Four Seasons Sharm El-Sheikh, the Four Seasons Nile Plaza, the Four Seasons San Stefano, J.W. Marriott Cairo, Sheraton Alexandria, Hilton Luxor, Intercontinental Cairo and Crown Plaza Sharm El-Sheikh.
13.50
One of our reporters Gavin Davids has been talking to the managing director of Accor, which has 16 hotels in Egypt. As you would expect, evacuation plans are underway for its staff. This just in from Gavin:
Accor, the world’s largest hotel operator, said that it would evacuate its foreign staff from its 16 hotels in Egypt, following the outbreak of riots in Cairo, its managing director said on Monday.
Approximately five percent of the hotelier’s management in the country are foreign nationals, Christophe Landis said on the sidelines of a press conference in Dubai. Approximately 18 staff members and their families are being flown out of the troubled city, he added.
“To be frank, no one knows exactly what will happen, but as a precautionary measure, what we have is 18 expatriates and their families, wives and children are coming back to Dubai, some of them will go back to Europe,” Landis said.
“The top management will remain in each hotel and country management will also remain in the country,” he added.
Landis expressed some concern over the fact that the Egyptian Army was more focused on guarding the five star luxury hotels, leaving the smaller hotels to secure their own security arrangements and protect their guests, but said that the situation seemed calm outside Cairo.
“I think yes, the business has been affected, but what we’ve heard is that the businesses outside Cairo, like Sharm El Sheikh, have not been affected, planes are coming in and out, and it looks like tourists are not worried, there is no tension in the streets. I think it’s because most of the Egyptians there are working with tourism,” Landis said.
Accor operates a number of hotels, ranging from luxury hotels to budget accommodation. The company currently operates 36 hotels across the GCC. It is present in 90 countries across the globe, with 4,100 hotels.
13.33
This tweet from CNN’s Ivan Watson suggests the military are helping hand out food to protestors.
“Far more soldiers and tanks in the streets today. Military was distributing bread to poor people from a truck off Tahrir square.” – IvanCNN
13.10
The Wall Street Journal has a good piece by the renowned author Zachary Karabell on the economic roots of the crisis. He points out that just days before the crisis, President Mubarak hosted the second Arab Economic, Development and Social Summit in the resort of Sharm al-Shaikh, calling for more Arab economic integration, regional transportation infrastructure and trade. And recent GDP growth has been relatively good at 4-5%.
So what’s gone so wrong? Karabell argues that for the last three decades, Egypt’s economy”has been locked in a system that stifles economic activity and innovation as surely as it does political expression.”
The link to the full piece is here, well worth a read.
13.00
More updates on companies shutting down and pulling their staff out of Egypt.
Jotun AS, a paint producer, has shut down its 160-person plant in Ismailia, Egypt, and local offices until further notice due to the unrest linked to the anti- government protests, according to spokeswoman Celin Huseby.
“All production and other activity is shut down at least until the end of the week and then we will do another status on Sunday to see what the next couple of weeks will bring,” she told Bloomberg.
AO Lukoil said it’s evacuating most of its staff from Egypt in response to the growing civil unrest in the country.
Royal Dutch Shell said it decided to temporarily relocate expatriate staff dependents and some non-essential staff given the deteriorating security situation.
Novatek OAO said it’s in the process of evacuating its staff from Egypt. Its exploration program in the country isn’t affected, a company spokesman said by telephone.
Credit Agricole SA said the 10 expatriate staff working at its Egyptian consumer-banking unit remain in the country, while their families left Egypt by plane.
12.46
As the day starts in Europe, political reaction to the crisis is starting to flow. First off, British Prime Minister David Cameron has just appeared on the BBC, to warn that repression of anti-government protests would “end badly” but stopped short of calling for President Hosni Mubarak to stand aside.
He said: “It’s very important that if it’s (U.S.) President Obama or whether it’s me, we’re not saying who should run this country or that country…It’s sensible to say that you do have a choice here, this repression, if you opt for that, that will end badly for Egypt, badly for the world. It’s the wrong choice to make.”
12.30
Time to take a look at the latest financial impact of the crisis.
First Egypt itself – the government had been hoping to raise $683million through debt auctions this week, but with banks and the stock market closed, that plan is now off. Central Bank Governor Farouk El-Okday told Bloomberg the country still has $36billion in reserves. Meanwhile, Egypt’s EGX 30 Stock Index was done 16% last week before the market closed.
The picture isn’t pretty across the GCC. Yesterday the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) plunged 4.3%, its biggest one day fall since May 25 last year. Emaar Properties, which is the largest foreign-direct investor in the country, saw its shares fall 8.3%.
At 11.30am Dubai time, this was the state of GCC markets: the DFM was down a huge 4.47%. The Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange was down 3.68%; Bahrain Stock Exchange down 1.47%; Kuwait Stock Exchange down 0.28%; Amnan Securities Exchange up 0.4%.; Muscat Securities Market up 0.05%.
12.18
Bloomberg is reporting that the Australian government will use a chartered Qantas Airways aircraft on Wednesday to evacuate citizens from Egypt.
There are about 1,100 Australians registered with the embassy in Egypt and “we anticipate there are more,” in the country, Prime Minister Julia Gillard told reporters in Canberra today. The government may charter an additional flight if needed, she said. The initial flight will travel to either Frankfurt or London, Gillard said.
“We wouldn’t be taking these steps if we weren’t concerned,” Gillard said. “It’s a situation in which people can be caught up in dangerous situations.”
Evacuees on the Boeing Co. 747 won’t be charged for the flight, according to Bloomberg.
12.00
On top of the million man march, Egypt’s protestors are also calling for a general strike across the country – beginning today and lasting indefinitely.
“We have also decided to begin an open ended general strike,” Eid Mohammed, one of the protesters and organisers, told AFP.
The strike was first called for by workers in the canal city of Suez late on Sunday.
“We will be joining the Suez workers and begin a general strike until our demands are met,” Mohammed Waked, another protest organiser, told AFP.
11.40
Tuesday is increasingly looking like being a key day in the crisis, with the so-called April 6 Movement planning to bring one million people out onto the streets of Cairo in protest. The protesters appear unfazed by the curfew, police, tanks and even fighter jets in the sky.
This is the latest from Aljazeera.net:
Early on Monday morning, unconfirmed reports said the police had been ordered back on the streets.”We are expecting a statement by the minister of interior about whether the police are going to return or not,” our correspondent said.
“The absence of police has given looters a free rein, forcing ordinary citizens to set up neighborhood patrols. Many people are wondering where the police disappeared to. There are two schools of thought as far as the police are concerned: One is that many of them decided to join the protesters. The other is that the regime was saying to the people, ‘You want to protest. We’ll pull back the police and you feel what anarchy feels like’,” our correspondent said.
11.30
Nissan Motor, Japan’s second- largest automaker, has closed its factory in Egypt until February 3 amid anti-government demonstrations.
“We decided to close our assembly plant in Egypt due to the unstable political situation,” Nissan spokesman Mitsuru Yonekawa told Bloomberg on Monday. The factory stopped production yesterday, he said.
Toyota has halted employees from traveling to Egypt on business trips following a safety alert from Japan’s foreign ministry.
11.25
Egypt’s opposition party, which has rallied around Mohamed ElBaradei, has formed a committee to convey their demands to the government as protests enter their seventh day.
ElBaradei has said he would be willing to serve as an interim president, if the people allow it.
“If the Egyptian people want me to serve as a bridge from an authoritarian system into a democracy, I will not let them down,” ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace laureate, said on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria’s GPS” programme.
11.15
Eyewitness report from Dina, a 35-year-old mother of three, who lives in Cairo.
“Nobody expected this. Last weekend, we just finished work and thought we will have a normal weekend.
Things are quiet at the moment but there is a lot of fear and there is a lot of looting. My friend works in a big hotel nearby and it was looted, luckily that has not happened to us. But it is very difficult – prisoners have escaped from prisons so people are very afraid.
There has also been a shortage of food, especially bread, which has been hard to find.
The airport has been manic. I have thought about leaving as my children have American passports, but the airport was manic. There were crowds of people but there are not enough planes to take people out.
Countries are sending planes but there is not enough time for them to land and take off as there is a curfew and planes can only land between 8am and 4pm.
What will be the impact on Egypt? It is not how long will the rioting last but how long will it take to get back to normal?
A friend of mine works in an American school, she said will we be able to send our kids to school and know they will be ok?”
10.50
Gulf airlines have begun increasing scheduled flights to Egypt in a bid to help with the evacuation of citizens and tourists stranded in the country during recent violent protests.
On Sunday, Amman-based Royal Jordanian added two extra flights between the Jordanian capital and Cairo. There is limited demand on flights to Cairo, whereas the aircraft are fully loaded back from the Egyptian capital, said Hussein Dabbas, RJ’s president and CEO.
Bahrain’s Gulf Air also reported that it operated a special flight to Cairo on Sunday to bring back Bahraini students from Egypt who were still in the country. “As the national airline of the Kingdom of Bahrain, it is our responsibility to ensure our Bahraini nationals are brought back home,” said Gulf Air CEO Samer Majali.
Similarly, Kuwait’s Wataniya Airways has announced it will add daily extra flights from Cairo to evacuate Kuwaiti nationals stranded during the protests.
Doha-based Qatar Airways said it is “operating all flights in and out of Egypt as scheduled” and carriers in the UAE said they were monitoring the situation but had not yet increased flights.
“Emirates services to and from Cairo are operating as scheduled. We are monitoring the situation closely and aim to give customers as much notice as possible should there be any changes to our operations,” said a spokesperson from the Dubai carrier.
Etihad said on Sunday its scheduled flights were also operating as normal, but warned passengers to check its website for further updates.
However, some airlines have decided to suspend flights to Egypt including German carriers Lufthansa and Air Berlin and US carrier Delta Airlines, which has “indefinitely suspended” flights between Cairo and the US.
10.25
One of the many side effects of the crisis is the complete breakdown of Egypt’s prison system, with several thousand prisoners having escaped after guards stood down from their posts (or were over-powered).
AFP is reporting that “bodies littered the road outside a Cairo prison and troops fixed with bayonets moved into another facility after thousands of convicts broke out of jails”.
It says that soldiers have set up check points along the Nile in the up market Maadi district near Tora prison, where many Islamist militants were being held. AFP also reports heavy rioting bear Abu Zaabal prison in eastern Cairo from where eight members of Hamas escaped yesterday. Another 34 Muslim Brothers have fled from their prison at Wadi Natrun in the north of Cairo.
10.15
Media are reporting a column of tanks have moved into to Cairo’s Tahri Square, where thousands of demonstrators had camped out for a third night, ignoring the government curfew.
Fighter jets had flown over the square all day Sunday, but failed to deter crowds of protesters demanding the end of President Mubarak’s 30-year rule.
10.05am
As the crisis enters its seventh full day, here is a summary of the main developments overnight.
*Opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei has predicted that change is coming to the country “in the next few days”.
He told a rally in Cairo on Sunday “You are the owners of this revolution, you are the future. Our essential demand is the departure of the regime and the beginning of a new Egypt in which each Egyptian lives in virtue, freedom and dignity.”
*The death toll is now officially at 102 though most observers believe it is far higher.
*Protests are being stepped up in the country’s second largest city Alexandria.
*The US is organizing evacuation flights for its citizens, with many western countries expected to do the same today.
The international community has noticeably been unwilling to back President Mubarak, with EU foreign ministers meeting later today to discuss the crisis. Twitter remains blocked in the country with other internet sites only working sporadically – although many people in Egypt are gradually managing to find ways around this.
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