Differing accounts emerge of protesters’ arrests in downtown Cairo

Security forces arrested 13 demonstrators in downtown Cairo's Talaat Harb Square on Thursday evening as they protested against the police and the military, the state-owned Middle East News Agency (MENA) reported.

The demonstrators allegedly set off fireworks during the protest, igniting a fire on a balcony overlooking the square, said the state-owned news site EgyNews.

The Ahrar Movement purportedly called for the protest just a few hours before it occurred, according to a post on the group’s Facebook page entitled, “Ahrar Movement members ignited a revolution in downtown.”

The group later updated the post saying that a police car was set ablaze after security forces arrived to disperse the crowd.

Founded in 2012, Ahrar is a youth movement dedicated to implementing Sharia, the creation of one Islamic nation and the refutation of what it calls the US domination of Muslim countries.

The privately owned news site Youm7 reported that Ahrar co-organized the protest with the April 6 Youth Movement, and also identified Ahrar as affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood. The paper also differed from the state-owned media’s accounts by reporting that 16 people were arrested during the protest’s dispersal, and were then taken to the Qasr al-Nil police station in Garden City.

In yet another account of the protest, the privately owned news site FilMogaz reported that the demonstrators represented a wide variety of youth movements, and that 15 were arrested in the dispersal.