Police forcefully disperse student protest outside Higher Education Ministry

Police forcefully dispersed student protesters outside the Ministry of Higher Education on Wednesday afternoon, with media reports indicating journalists and photographers covering the demonstration were assaulted.

Over 100 high school graduates and some parents and supporters staged a protest against university placement regulations outside the ministry’s headquarters in Downtown Cairo on Wednesday, as police forces moved in to disperse them.

Privately owned Al-Masry Al-Youm news outlet reported that the students were protesting against irregularities in the third phase of the placement system for public universities, along with what they described as the ministry’s disregard for their urgent demands to enroll in universities ahead of the 2015/2016 academic year, which is due to start this month.

Protesters chanted, “We are students not thugs,” and other slogans stating that they could not afford to enroll in private universities or institutions.

Al-Masry Al-Youm added that riot police were deployed, along with an armored personnel carrier, in order to keep the student protesters from blocking Qasr al-Aini Street outside the ministry.

Riot police used batons to disperse the protesters, causing several of them to fall unconscious, according to Al-Masry Al-Youm, who also reported that several journalists and photographers covering the protest had their cameras destroyed or confiscated.

The state-owned Al-Akhbar Masr news website confirmed that “security forces assaulted journalists and photographers,” resulting in the hospitalization of photojournalist Amr Abdel Rahman from privately owned Al-Tahrir newspaper. He suffered from bleeding to his eye and his camera was destroyed in the process.

Al-Akhbar Masr also reported that photographer Mostafa Basseem, from the privately owed Al-Watan newspaper, experienced bruising, and police forces confiscated his camera and other personal possessions. A third photographer, Ali Abdeen, from privately owned Al-Fagr newspaper, was also injured in the violent dispersals.