Julian Assange has denied any link with alleged whistleblower Bradley Manning / AP Source: AP
No link between Assange and alleged whistleblower
Authorities cannot extradite him without evidence
US wanted to prosecute Assange for espionage
WIKILEAKS founder Julian Assange has slipped from the reach of US investigators, according to an American news report.
Authorities had been unable to link the WikiLeaks founder to Bradley Manning, the army private jailed for passing confidential information to the whistleblowing website, NBC News said yesterday.
The network's chief Pentagon correspondent Jim Miklaszewski said sources inside the US military claimed they were struggling to find any evidence to prove Mr Assange and Pte Manning communicated with each other.
"The officials say that while investigators have determined that Manning had allegedly unlawfully downloaded tens of thousands of documents on to his own computer and passed them to an unauthorised person, there is apparently no evidence he passed the files directly to Assange, or had any direct contact with the WikiLeaks figure," Mr Miklaszewski said.
If the reports are true, authorities will be powerless to extradite Mr Assange to the US to face criminal charges relating to his website's leaking of classified documents.
The recent release of a massive cache of US cables angered and embarrassed the US, leading the Obama Administration to label Assange a "hi-tech terrorist".
News reports late last year revealed the White House was exploring options of criminally prosecuting Mr Assange under the Espionage Act.
US authorities were reportedly trying to build a criminal conspiracy case against Mr Assange, to prove he helped Pte Manning when the soldier allegedly copied more than 250,000 classified US government cables on to a CD and smuggled the data to WikiLeaks.
Australian-born Mr Assange, 38, is on bail in England while he waits to face a London court on February 7 for extradition to Sweden on sex offences that allegedly occurred last year.
Mr Assange has claimed he had never heard of Pte Manning.
But the 23-year-old soldier, in solitary confinement since July, allegedly communicated with Mr Assange and WikiLeaks on Twitter, according to reports last year.
The 23-year-old Julian Assange on his way to Melbourne’s Victoria county court in May 1995. He pleaded guilty to 24 counts of hacking. Photograph: Fairfax Photos
Glimpsed in the half-light of a London evening, the figure may just have passed for female. She emerged cautiously from a doorway and folded herself into a battered red car. There were a few companions – among them a grim-visaged man with Nordic features and a couple of nerdy youngsters. One seemed to have given the old woman her coat.
The car weaved through the light Paddington traffic, heading north in the direction of Cambridge.
There was no obvious sign of pursuit. Nonetheless, they periodically pulled off the road into a lay-by and waited – lights killed – in the gloom. By 10pm they reached the flatlands of East Anglia, a sepia landscape where the occasional disused sugar factory hulked out of the blackness.
Fifteen miles inland, at the village of Ellingham, they turned left. The car skidded on a driveway, and drove past an ancient dovecote before stopping in front of a grand Georgian manor house. The woman stepped from the car. There was something odd about her.
Close up, it was obvious that this strange figure was Julian Assange, his platinum hair concealed by a wig. At more than 6ft tall, he was never going to be a very convincing female.
"You can't imagine how ridiculous it was," WikiLeaks's James Ball later said. "He'd stayed dressed up as an old woman for more than two hours." Assange was swapping genders in a pantomime attempt to evade possible pursuers.
In a breathtakingly short time, WikiLeaks had soared out of its previous niche as an aobscure radical website to become a widely known online news platform.
Assange had published leaked footage showing airborne US helicopter pilots executing two Reuters employees in Baghdad, seemingly as if they were playing a video-game.
He had followed up this coup with another, even bigger sensation: an unprecedented newspaper deal, brokered with the Guardian newspaper in London, to reveal hundreds of thousands of classified US military field reports from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, many of them damning – and the biggest leak, a deluge of diplomatic cables from US embassies worldwide, was yet to come.
Date with danger
The unusual Australian who, in 2006, wrote up his dating profile for the OKCupid website used the name 'Harry Harrison'. He was 36 years old, 6ft 2ins tall and, said the site's online test, "87% slut." He began: "WARNING: Want a regular, down to earth guy? Keep moving ... I am DANGER, ACHTUNG!"
Harry described himself as "variously professionally involved in international journalism/ books, documentaries, cryptography, intelligence activities, civil rights, political activism, white collar crime and the internet". "A pig headed activist intellectual," he was seeking "siren for love affair, children and occasional criminal conspiracy".
His gallery of photographs showed a man with pale skin, sharp features and wind-blown silver-grey hair. In some he has a half-smile, in others he stares down the barrel of the camera.
Harry Harrison was a pseudonym, and the person behind the mask was Julian Assange, a computer hacker living in a crowded student house in Melbourne, dreaming up a scheme for an idealistic information insurgency which was eventually to become celebrated – and execrated – worldwide as WikiLeaks.
Assange had a striking and some critics would say, damaged personality.
It was on peacock display in this dating profile, but probably rooted deep in his Australian childhood and youth.
His obsession with computers, and his compulsion to keep moving both seemed to have their origins in his restless early years.
So too, perhaps, did the rumblings from others that Assange was somewhere on the autistic spectrum. Assange would himself joke, when asked if was autistic: "Aren't all men?". His dry sense of humour made him easy to like and attractive – perhaps too attractive – to women.
And there was his high analytical intelligence. In a different incarnation, Assange could perhaps have been the successful chief executive of a major corporation.
There were a few demerits OKCupid left out. Assange's social skills could seem lacking. The way his eyes flickered around the room was curious; one Guardian journalist described it as "toggling". And occasionally he forgot to wash. Collaborators who fell out with him – there was to be a long list – accused him of imperiousness and a callous disregard for those of whom he disapproved.
Certainly, when crossed, Assange could get very angry indeed, his mood changing instantaneously. But in one way the OKCupid profile proved to be dizzyingly accurate. Four years later, in 2010, nobody would be left in any doubt that Assange really did mean DANGER, ACHTUNG!
Julian was born on 3 July 1971 in Townsville, in the state of Queensland, in Australia's sub-tropical north. His mother, Christine, was the daughter of Warren Hawkins, described by colleagues as a rigid and traditionalist academic who became a college principal; the family settled in Australia from 19th-century Scotland.
Julian's biological father John Shipton is absent from much of the record: at 17, Christine abruptly left home, selling her paintings to buy a motorcycle, a tent and a map. Some 1,500 miles later she arrived in Sydney and joined its counter-culture scene. She fell in love with Shipton, a rebellious young man she met at an anti-Vietnam war demonstration in 1970. The relationship ended and he would play no further role in Assange's life for many years.
They had no contact until after Assange turned 25. Later they met, with Julian discovering he had inherited his architect father's highly logical and dispassionate intellect. One friend said Shipton was "like a mirror shining back at Julian". Assange believed he had inherited his "rebel gene" from his unconventional father. In 2006, at the start of Julian's remarkable mission to uncover secrets, he registered the wikileaks.org domain name under Shipton's name.
After the birth of her child, Christine moved as a single mother to Magnetic Island, a short ferry ride across the bay from Townsville. She married Brett Assange, an actor and theatre director. Their touring lifestyle was the backdrop to Assange's early years. His stepfather staged and directed plays and his mother did the make-up, costumes and set design.
During his childhood Assange attended 37 different schools, emerging with no qualifications whatsoever. "Some people are really horrified and say: 'You poor thing, you went to all these schools.' But actually during this period I really liked it," he later said.
After her relationship with Brett Assange broke down, Christine became tempestuously involved with a third, much younger man, Keith Hamilton.
Hamilton was an amateur musician and a member of a New Age group, the Santiniketan Park Association. He was also, according to Assange, a manipulative psychopath.
"My mother became involved with a person who seems to be the son of Anne Hamilton-Byrne, of the Anne Hamilton-Byrne cult in Australia," said Assange, "and we kept getting tracked down, possibly because of leaks in the social security system, and having to leave very quickly to a new city, and lived under assumed names." For the next five or six years, the three lived as fugitives.
When Assange was 13 or 14, his mother had rented a house across the street from an electronics shop. Assange began going there and working on a Commodore 64. His mother saved to buy the computer for her older son as a present. Assange began teaching himself code. At 16 he got his first modem.
He attended a programme for gifted children in Melbourne, where he acquired "an introverted and emotionally disturbed" girlfriend, as he put it. Assange grew interested in science and roamed around libraries. Soon he discovered hacking.
Underground: Tales of Hacking, Madness & Obsession on the Electronic Frontier appeared in 1997. Published under the byline of Suelette Dreyfus, a Melbourne academic, Assange is credited as researcher, but his imprint his palpable – in parts it reads like an Assange biography.
The book depicts the international computer underground of the 90s: "A veiled world populated by characters slipping in and out of the half-darkness. It is not a place where people use their real names." Assange chose an epigraph from Oscar Wilde: "Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth."
"[He] went to school," runs the story in Underground. "Often he didn't. The school system didn't hold much interest for him. It didn't feed his mind … The Sydney computer system was a far more interesting place to muck around in than the rural high school."
High-level hacking
By 1991 Assange was probably Australia's most accomplished hacker. He and two others founded International Subversives magazine, offering tips on "phreaking" – how to break into telephone systems illegally and make free calls. The magazine had an exclusive readership: its circulation was just three, the hackers themselves.
In the spring of 1991, the three hackers found an exciting new target: MILNET, the US military's secret defence data network. Quickly, Assange discovered a back door. He got inside. "We had total control over it for two years," he later claimed. The hackers also routinely broke into the computer systems at Australia's National University.
But he suspected Victoria police were about to raid his home. According to Underground: "He wiped his disks, burnt his printouts, and left" to doss temporarily with his girlfriend. The pair joined a squatters' union, and when Assange was 18 she became pregnant. They married and had a baby boy, Daniel.
But as Assange's anxiety increased, and police finally closed in on his outlaw circle of hackers, his wife moved out, taking their 20-month-old son Daniel with them. Assange was hospitalised with depression. For a period he slept outdoors, rambling around the eucalyptus forests in Dandenong Ranges national park; he would wake up covered in mosquito bites.
But it wasn't until 1994 that he was finally charged, with the case only being heard in 1996. He pleaded guilty in Melbourne's Victoria County Court to 24 counts of hacking. The prosecution described Assange as "the most active" and "most skilful" of the group, and pressed for a prison sentence. Assange's motive, according to the prosecution, was "simply an arrogance and a desire to show off his computer skills".
At one point Assange turned up with flowers for one of the prosecution lawyers, Andrea Pavleka (described in Underground as "tall, slender and long-legged, with a bob of sandy blonde curls, booky spectacles resting on a cute button nose and an infectious laugh"). It was a courtly gesture. Assange's lawyer felt obliged to point out to Assange: "She doesn't want to date you, Julian. She wants to put you in jail."
The judge said he regarded Assange's offences as "quite serious". But there was no evidence to suggest he had sought personal gain. Rather than a malicious hacker, he had acted, the judge said, out of "intellectual inquisitiveness".
Assange considered himself the victim of an injustice. He later quoted Solzhenitsyn's First Circle: "To feel that home is the camaraderie of persecuted, and in fact, prosecuted, polymaths in a Stalinist slave labour camp! How close the parallels to my own adventures! … Such prosecution in youth is a defining peak experience. To know the state for what it really is! To see through that veneer the educated swear to disbelieve in but still slavishly follow with their hearts! … Your belief in the mendacity of the state … begins only with a jackboot at the door. True belief forms when led into the dock and referred to in the third person. True belief is when a distant voice booms 'the prisoner shall now rise' and no one else in the room stands."
Convicted but leniently treated, Assange was now an unemployed father in Melbourne surviving on a single parent pension.
The family courts had given him sole custody of his son.
Assange drafted on his bravely named blog, IQ.org, an apparently fanciful theory for overthrowing injustice in the world: "The more secretive or unjust an organisation is, the more leaks induce fear and paranoia in its leadership and planning coterie … Since unjust systems, by their nature, induce opponents, and in many places barely have the upper hand, mass leaking leaves them exquisitely vulnerable to those who seek to replace them with more open forms of governance."
Assange spoke of a high-flown calling: "If we can only live once, then let it be a daring adventure that draws on all our powers … Men in their prime, if they have convictions, are tasked to act on them."
He told potential supporters about his secret new plan: "This is a restricted internal development mailing list for w-i-k-i-l-e-a-k-s-.-o-r-g. Please do not mention that word directly in these discussions; refer instead to 'WL'." On 9 December 2006, an email signed "WL" also arrived out of the blue for Daniel Ellsberg, the whistleblower of Vietnam war renown.
The hacker underground was only one part of the soil out of which WikiLeaks grew. Another was the anti-capitalist radicals – the community of environmental activists, human rights campaigners and political revolutionaries who make up what used to be known in the 1960s as the "counter-culture".
As Assange went public for the first time about WikiLeaks, he travelled to Nairobi in Kenya to set out their stall at the World Social Forum in January 2007.
It was Kenya that gave WikiLeaks its first journalistic coup. A massive report about the alleged corruption of former president Daniel Arap Moi had been commissioned from the private inquiry firm Kroll. But his successor, President Mwai Kibaki, who commissioned the report, subsequently failed to release it, allegedly for political reasons.
"This report was the holy grail of Kenyan journalism," Assange later said. "I went there in 2007 and got hold of it." The actual circumstances of publication were more complex.
The report was leaked to Mwalimu Mati, head of Mars Group Kenya, an anti-corruption group. "Someone dumped it in our laps," he said. Mati, prompted by a contact in Germany, had previously registered as a volunteer with WikiLeaks
The fear of retribution made it too dangerous to post the report on the group's own website: "So we thought: can we not put it on WikiLeaks?" The story appeared simultaneously on 31 August on the front page of the Guardian in London. The full text of the document was posted on WikiLeaks' website headed, "The missing Kenyan billions".
A press release explained, "WikiLeaks has not yet publicly 'launched'. We are open only to submissions from journalistic and dissident contacts. However, given the political situation in Kenya we feel we would be remiss to withhold this document any longer." The site added: "Attribution should be to … 'Julian A, WikiLeaks's spokesman'." He later published another report: "The Cry of Blood – Extra-Judicial Killings and Disappearances". It was based on evidence obtained by the Kenyan National Commission on Human Rights.
Four people associated with investigating the killings were themselves subsequently murdered, including human rights activists Oscar Kingara and John Paul Oulu.
Assange and his group were by now starting to see a flow of genuinely leaked documents, including some from UK military sources. But Assange had by now discovered, to his chagrin, that simply posting long lists of raw and random documents on to a website failed to change the world. "Our initial idea was, 'Look at all those people editing Wikipedia. Look at all the junk that they're working on," he wrote.
"Surely all those people that are busy working on articles about history and mathematics and so on, and all those bloggers that are busy pontificating about … human rights disasters … surely those people will step forward, given fresh source material, and do something?' No.
It's all bullshit. It's all bullshit. In fact, people write about things, in general (if it's not part of their career), because they want to display their values to their peers, who are already in the same group. Actually, they don't give a fuck about the material."
Assange would have to carry on hunting for a WikiLeaks model that could both bring in working revenue and gain global political attention.
Egypt protests: Bloodshed on the streets as human price of Hosni Mubarak's clampdown emerges
The full horror of Egypt's political convulsions has emerged, as relatives gathered at morgues filled with bodies and doctors described their heroic efforts to save the wounded.
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By Colin Freeman, and Richard Spencer Cairo9:49PM GMT 29 Jan 2011
As President Hosni Mubarak installed his head of intelligence as the first vice-president of his 30-year rule in a desperate effort to cling to power, it became clear that the death toll from the past two days of violent disturbances was even higher than officials claimed.
A tally of credible figures from around Egypt collated by The Sunday Telegraph showed that at least 89 people had died, compared with the 62 admitted by officials on Saturday. A further 2,500 were said to have been injured.
Among the dead were 10 policemen — some had been attacked by protesters. The civilian dead and injured included many shot with live rounds: doctors and protesters displayed bullets they had picked up from the streets after police — and in some cases soldiers — opened fire.
The use of live ammunition against his people, with witnesses claiming that deadly rounds had been fired by units of the elite presidential guard, throws into further doubt continued American support for Mr Mubarak’s regime.
President Barack Obama telephoned his counterpart late on Friday night to urge the 82-year-old leader to take concrete steps toward reform. “Violence will not address the grievances of the Egyptian people, and suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away,” he said after the 30-minute conversation.
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David Cameron, the Prime Minister, last night spoke to President Mubarak and expressed his “grave concern” at the violence on the streets. A Downing Street spokesman said: “He emphasised that violent repression of peaceful protest was wrong and counterproductive.
“The Prime Minister urged the president to take bold steps to accelerate political reform and build democratic legitimacy, which should be reflected by an inclusive government with the credibility to carry this agenda forward.”
William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, urged Mr Mubarak to make “real and visible” reforms, adding: “We call on the government to exercise restraint and on the Egyptian people to pursue their legitimate grievances peacefully.”
Yesterday, protesters again defied tanks, bullets and a curfew to gather in Cairo and demand the removal of their president. There were scenes of high emotion at morgues around the country as wailing families demanded the bodies of those killed on Friday.
There were clashes in towns and cities across the country, as the wave of protests — now entering its sixth day and inspired by Tunisia’s Jasmine Revolution — showed little sign of abating.
Political prisoners went on the rampage in two prisons and at least 1,000 protesters throwing Molotov cocktails tried to ransack the Interior Ministry before police opened fire with live rounds, killing at least three people. There were similar protests in Alexandria, and in Suez hundreds joined in demonstrations. Thousands of foreign tourists spent the day at Cairo’s international airport as they tried to escape.
British Airways chartered a plane to bring home Britons who wanted to abandon their holidays early, although a spokesman said there were no plans for a mass evacuation.
A British Midland flight to Cairo, with 64 passengers on board, turned back midway because of the unrest and other airlines altered their schedules to avoid arriving after the 4pm curfew.
At least 25,000 Britons were holidaying at the heavily-guarded resort of Sharm-el-Sheikh and were said to be in no danger. Security forces maintained a ring round the resort, with police officers manning checkpoints along all major roads to protect the tourists and the vital source of foreign revenue which they represent. The Foreign Office warned against all but essential travel to the main cities of Egypt, including tourist sites such as Luxor, but did not include the Red Sea resort.
Armoured personnel carriers and tanks moved into the historic Cairo suburb of Giza to protect the pyramids.
President Mubarak announced early yesterday morning that he was to fire his entire cabinet and replace all his ministers in an attempt to assuage popular anger. It was the clearest indication yet that the man once considered “president for life” now knows he is locked in a battle for survival.
Within hours, Ahmed Shafiq, the country’s aviation minister and, like Mr Mubarak, a former head of the Egyptian Air Force, was appointed prime minister. But his decision to install his close confidant, Mr Suleiman, 72, as vice-president, provoked the anger of Egyptians campaigning for the end of Mr Mubarak’s autocratic, police state.
“He is just like Mubarak, there is no change,” said a protester outside the Interior Ministry.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the Egyptian former head of the UN’s nuclear energy inspection agency, who has emerged as a voice of the country’s opposition flew into Cairo on Friday. He said appointing a new vice-president and prime minister would not be enough to end the revolt.
“The system of Hosni Mubarak has failed to achieve the political, economic and social demands of the Egyptian people and we want to build a new Egypt founded on freedom, democracy and social justice,” he told Al Jazeera, the news channel. “The main demand is that President Mubarak announces clearly that he will resign, or that he will not run again.”
In a separate interview with a French television station, Mr ElBaradei said: “The protests will continue with even more intensity until the Mubarak regime falls.”
The elevation of Mr Suleiman — who has made a career of stamping down on Islamist opposition while forging closer relations with Israel — offers a possible route to the exit door for Mr Mubarak when presidential elections are held later this year.
The intelligence chief has long been tipped as the likeliest successor from within the regime, if Mr Mubarak shelved plans to groom Gamal, his US-educated son, for the job. Gordon Thomas, a British intelligence analyst, said the urbane spymaster, with clipped English vowels and a neat moustache, was well-regarded by his counterparts in MI6, the CIA and Mossad.
“He has been advising Mubarak to be very careful with the military and urged him to promise to meet the protesters, so he has a good sense of the changes that need to be made,” he said. “The question is whether Mubarak will allow him to do that.”
Last night there were unconfirmed rumours that younger members of the family — including Gamal — were fleeing to London.
The upheavals, and Mr Mubarak’s response to them, leave Western powers in an awkward situation as they support protesters’ calls for democratic reforms, but without the bringing down of their most useful Arab allies.
On Saturday, doctors gave vivid accounts of the savagery that erupted for a short while in Cairo.
Dr Mona Mina, who treated protesters at a makeshift aid station close to Tahrir Square throughout Friday night, the main scene of demonstrations in Cairo, said patients claimed they had been shot by members of the Egyptian Presidential Guard. “This was not trying to frighten people,” she said. “When you shoot into the head and chest you are killing people.”
There are fears that a political vacuum in Egypt could allow the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt’s powerful Islamist opposition, which is officially banned.
The organisation stayed out of the protests until Thursday. Yesterday it called for Mr Mubarak to leave the country after more than 350 of its members were arrested.
“Go Mubarak, have mercy on this people and leave so as not to increase the destruction of Egypt,” said Yusuf al-Qaradawi, one of the movement’s spiritual leaders, who lives in Qatar.
Protesters remained on the streets after darkness fell as reports circulated that some police officers had taken refuge inside mosques to avoid the protesters’ wrath.
In Iran, Mir Hossein Mousavi, the main opposition leader, said the demonstrations in Egypt and Tunisia were similar to those that shook Tehran in 2009. “The Middle East is on the threshold of great events these days that can affect the fate of the region and the world.”
Additional reporting by Alastair Jamieson in Sharm-el-Sheikh
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A demonstrator uses his shoe to hit a picture of President Hosni Mubarak during a protest at Tahrir Square, Cairo Photograph: Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images
Downing Street says that David Cameron supports President Obama's call for an "orderly transition" in Egypt. The statement from No 10 said:
"The prime minister made clear that restrictions on the media and internet were unacceptable and should be lifted immediately.
"The prime minister and President Obama were united in their view that Egypt now needed a comprehensive process of political reform, with an orderly, Egyptian-led transition leading to a government that responded to the grievances of the Egyptian people and to their aspirations for a democratic future."
Shots sound like they are coming from the east of the city, Peter Beaumont says. Tracer rounds from heavy calibre weapons suggest they are military. Bursts from the direction of the airport and Heliopolis – where the presidential palace is located. Tanks seen moving fast eastwards.
Peter Beaumont in Cairo reports hearing bursts of gunfire from several directions, sounds coming from somewhere far beyond Tahrir Square.
First all we thought it might be vigilantes firing. It's not clear whether it's the army trying to clear people off the steets. May be warning shots. Coming from different directions.
State TV broadcasts pictures of recaptured prisoners as well as Molotov cocktails, machetes and other weapons said to have been taken from demonstrators.
Human Rights Watch's Egypt researcher, Heba Fatma Morayef, says the mood in Tahrir Square is orderly and cooperative:
Several thousand people remain in Tahrir Square, many say they're planning to spend the night and stay till Mubarak resigns. There was a huge cheer when we heard Mohamed ElBaradei was coming but unfortunately most of us couldn't hear what he said - no loudspeakers, apparently.
The square has emptied out since the afternoon but it's still a great atmosphere, a sense of solidarity, and very well-behaved - people are sitting around bonfires, or walking around picking up rubbish. Crowds who find occasional looters drag them over to the soldiers and hand them over. And no sexual harassment – which is not the norm downtown, especially when there are big groups gathering! We're happy to be eating koshary - thank goodness vendors are still selling street food because we're starving.
A White House statement details President Obama's round of phone calls to foreign leaders in Turkey, Israel Saudi Arabia and the UK:
Today, he spoke to prime minister Cameron of the United Kingdom. During his calls, the president reiterated his focus on opposing violence and calling for restraint; supporting universal rights, including the right to peaceful assembly, association, and speech; and supporting an orderly transition to a government that is responsive to the
aspirations of the Egyptian people.
The president asked each of the leaders that he spoke to for their assessment of the situation, and agreed to stay in close contact going forward.
There is feverish speculation regarding the whereabouts of Gamal Mubarak, the president's son who had been groomed for succession. He has not been seen in Egypt for several days. Arab and Iranian websites are claiming that he has fled the country.
Update from an official at the celebrated Egyptian Museum in the centre of Cairo reports that some damage has been done by intruders who broke into the Tutankhamun galleries. He says:
Thank God they opened only one case! The criminals found a statue of the king on a panther, broke it, and threw it on the floor. I am very thankful that all of the antiquities that were damaged in the museum can be restored, and the tourist police caught all of the criminals that broke into it. On Saturday, the army secured the museum again and guarded it from all sides.
What is really beautiful is that not all Egyptians were involved in the looting of the museum. A very small number of people tried to break, steal and rob. The Egyptian people are calling for freedom, not destruction. When I left the museum on Saturday, I was met outside by many Egyptians, who asked if the museum was safe and what they could do to help. The people were happy to see an Egyptian official leave his home and come to Tahrir Square without fear; they loved that I came to the museum.
Ian Black, the Guardian's Middle East editor, has filed this on the president's attempted fightback:
Hosni Mubarak sought to boost his battered image as Egypt's leader, flaunting the support of the armed forces whose loyalty he will need to retain if he is to survive the country's unprecedented political upheaval.
The embattled president was shown on state TV visiting an army operations centre flanked by his new deputy, Omar Suleiman and defence minister Mohammed Hussein Tantawi – listening to briefings as if directing a battle.
Official security sources have announced that the curfew will be extended tomorrow, starting from 3pm local time until 8am on Tuesday. It has been ignored nationwide so far.
Army tank joins in protesters' procession through Alexandria, Al-Jazeera TV reports. The commander of the tank insisted that the army had "no intention of stopping this march", the station says.
Owen Bowcott here taking over from Matthew Weaver. According to the Press Association, foreign secretary William Hague is due to speak to Egypt's foreign minister Aboul Gheit later tonight.
European Union officials have said that the unrest in Egypt will top the agenda at a meeting of EU foreign ministers on Monday in Brussels, AP reports.
The Dutch foreign ministry urged its nationals to "seriously consider leaving," while Switzerland advised its citizens to leave until further notice. Turkey's Dogan news agency reported that the Turkish government is evacuating about 750 nationals.
Belgian foreign ministry spokesman Patrick Deboeck said ambassadors in Cairo assessed "the state of play" at a meeting Sunday and EU nations are not planning evacuations. He added that so far there have been no incidents involving EU citizens in Egypt.
Simon Tisdall, the Guardian's foreign affairs columnist, has this report on the mass prison breakouts, which security officials said took place at four jails overnight.
Hundreds of members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's leading Islamist political party, were among thousands of prisoners who escaped during overnight mass breakouts from four jails, security officials said today.
Armed gangs took advantage of the chaos in Cairo and other cities to free the prisoners, starting fires and engaging prison guards in gun battles, officials said. Several inmates were reportedly killed during the fighting and some were recaptured.
• Thousands of protesters have returned to the streets of Cairo on the sixth day of protests. There is a heavy military presence in Tahrir square. Protesters are demanding the resignation of president Hosni Mubarak, and his newly appointed deputy Omar Suleiman.
• Opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei has addressed protesters in Tahrir square. "We cannot go back on what we have begun," ElBaradei tells the crowds. "We have one main demand: the end of the regime and the beginning of a new stage, a new Egypt."
• Al-Jazeera has been taken off air in Egypt, in move that has been widely condemned as an attack on free speech. The network was also banned from showing live footage in Cairo.
• Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, has called on President Mubarak to hold free and fair elections – but said Washington was not considering a cutoff of aid to Cairo for now.
• The Muslim Brotherhood has called for a "national salvation government". Ian Black, the Guardian's Middle East editor, suggests it remains unlikely that Mubarak government will agree to negotiate with to ElBaradei, but the publication of the demand adds a significant new element to the political angle.
• There are reports of a mass prison breakout. Leading members of the opposition Muslim Brotherhood were among those freed, the organisation said. Residents have taken control of law and order in many neighbourhoods.
This is interesting - the police will return to the streets tomorrow, but not to tackle the protests, security sources told Reuters.
One of the sources said police would return to traffic, criminal and other work but would not be sent in to confront protesters, with whom they clashed often violently in the first days of the protests. The army were ordered in on Friday.
Egyptian TV viewers can't see the footage of ElBaradei because al-Jazeera continues to be blocked. State TV has been showing footage of security guards outside a government building, the network said.
Human Rights Watch urged the regime to allow the network to be allowed to broadcast.
"Shutting down al-Jazeera is a sign of just how desperate the government has become to cut Egyptians off from news, information, and communication," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch in an email. "But like all its other efforts to rein in access to information, this too seems destined to fail, as the world continues to hear and watch Egyptians demanding their freedom," she said.
Al-Jazeera is showing footage of ElBaradei's arrival in Tahrir Square.
"Change is coming in the next few days," ElBaradei told the crowd, according to Reuters.
"You have taken back your rights and what we have begun cannot go back... We have one main demand - the end of the regime and the beginning of a new stage, a new Egypt."
"I bow to the people of Egypt in respect. I ask of you patience."
ElBaradei is preparing to address the crowd in Tahrir Square and has been handed a megaphone, Jack Shenker reports.
"ElBaradei stared out at the crowd with a half smile on his face. There were waves of excitement and optimism as he arrived. But but a notable number chanted anti-ElBaradei slogans, asking 'how can you steal our revolution now?'", Jack told us in another phone update.
"It's certainly a key moment. Many people in the crowd feel this is the final hours of the Mubarak regime," Jack said before the line cut out.
"It's still unclear at the moment what his [ElBaradei's] reception will be. He's popular among some people, but there are those who felt he has joined the protests too late and is only arriving now once the danger is apparently over. Either way this is a special moment," Jack added.
To listen to the full audio turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
He managed to get round Internet restrictions to post this on his Arabist blog.
Something very fishy is taking place — the Egyptian people are being manipulated and terrified by the withdrawal of the police yesterday, reports (some of them perhaps untrue) of widespread looting, and yesterday's (during the day) relatively low military presence in the city.
I can only speak about central Cairo, I suspect the situation is much worse in the Suez Canal cities, Alexandria and the Delta, and perhaps most of all the Sinai. I spoke to my former bawaab (doorman) who is near Aswan, where is he the police is still out and there is no military, although the local NDP office was ransacked and set on fire. So the situation is different from place to place, and there is very little national-level visibility.
There is a discourse of army vs. police that is emerging. I don't fully buy it — the police was pulled out to create this situation of chaos, and it's very probable that agent provocateurs are operating among the looters, although of course there is also real criminal gangs and neighborhoods toughs operating too.
For me, Omar Suleiman being appointed VP means that he's in charge. This means the old regime is trying to salvage the situation. Chafiq's appointment as PM also confirms a military in charge. These people are part of the way Egypt was run for decades and are responsible for the current situation. I suspect more and more people, especially among the activists, are realizing this.
I hope to have more steady internet access later. For now, the questions are:
• Why was the NPD building fire not put out even though it risks spreading to the Egyptian Museum?
• Why is Egyptian state TV terrifying people with constant pictures of criminal gangs?
• Why was there such a small military deployment during the day yesterday?
• Why were all police forces pulled out, and who made that decision?
• What is the chain of command today in the military? Is Armed Forces Chief of Staff Sami Enan still in position?
• If the reports about prison breakouts are true, how come these facilities have not been secured?
• Why are we getting reports of intelligence offices burning documents, CDs and tapes?
The situation is obviously very confusing at the moment. All I can say is that I have a hard time believing that Mubarak is still in charge, and that the hard core of the regime is using extreme means to salvage its position.
ElBaradei is on his way to Tahrir Square, Reuters confirms.
Egyptian activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mohamed ElBaradei plans join protesters in Cairo's Tahrir Square, the hub of the protest calling for President Hosni Mubarak to quit, an opposition figure said.
"Dr Mohamed ElBaradei will be joining protesters in Tahrir," Mustafa el-Naggar told Reuters, adding he would come to the square later today, his first visit to the hub of the protest since returning to Egypt on Thursday.
Naggar is the coordinator for the National Coalition for Change, a coalition of opposition movements seeking political reform and headed by ElBaradei.
"Every man seems to be carrying a stick." Al Jazeera reports on the efforts of residents to control order in a Cairo neighbourhood after darkness fell tonight. There are makeshift road blocks at almost every corner, the reporter says.
To listen to the full audio turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
"Egypt needs to catch up with the rest of the world, we need to be free, democratic and a society where people have the right to live in freedom and dignity.... That's what you get after 70 years, Fareed, of utter brutal dictatorship, supported by everybody in the name of pseudo-stability."
ElBaradei has changed his mind again about joining today's protests. His wife has been in touch with Jack for a third time. She says he is planning to go after all. She apologises for confusing Guardian readers, Jack reports.
False rumours that Mubarak had fallen were greeted by hugs and cheering by protesters in Tahrir Square, Peter Beaumont reports from Tahrir square. In an audio interview he talks about possible preparations by the army to crackdown against the protesters. Water cannons have been moved in and tanks have been split into two columns, he says.
"The mood amongst the people, who were very positive towards the army, does seem to be changing. People are very very suspicious of the army now. They want to know why a squadron of Egypt's best tanks is sitting in the entrance to square," he said. To listen to the full audio turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
ElBaradei's wife just called Jack to say he won't be going out to join the protesters after all.
Mohammed ElBaradei is planning to join the protest this afternoon, his wife just told the Guardian's Jack Shenker.
Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director from Human Rights Watch, has a grim update on the rising death toll in Suez.
Just back from Suez where we met the director of the main hospital, who confirmed 17 dead so far. Two were shot dead yesterday. On Friday 12 were killed by gunfire and another 104 were injured. On Thursday three were killed.
The atmosphere in Suez is tense, the big complaint is the absence of security. A lot of rubble in the streets from stone-throwing, street battles etc. The army is out in force, tanks are stationed on the streets and the area around the main government buildings is completely blocked off. A major police station that on Thursday was surrounded by security and said to be holding many detainees picked up at protests was torched and is now gutted.
Police and government officials have pulled out so there are no government services - the governor has been gone since Tuesday so there's a power vacuum. People formed impromptu block committees to provide local security, armed (they say) with only sticks and kitchen knives. The locals say the only people with weapons are police who've taken off their uniforms and are responsible for most of the looting and crime.
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The Muslim Brotherhood has called for a "national salvation government". This is very significant according to our Middle East editor Ian Black.
Sensational political developments in Cairo, with reports that five opposition movements, including the key Muslim Brotherhood, have mandated Mohammed ElBaradei to negotiate over the formation of a temporary "national salvation government."
Osama Ghazlai Harb of the National Democrsatic Front told BBC Arabic that this would be a transitional administration that would oversee the cancellation of the emergency laws and the release of all political prisoners.
The powerful Muslim Brotherhood, which has kept a low profile so far, said it was backing the demand along with other four groups.
It seems unlikely at this stage that the Mubarak government will agree to negotiate with to ElBaradei, but the publication of the demand adds a significant new element to Egypt's rapidly unfolding political crisis.
More balancing act comments from Hillary Clinton to US TV.
"We want to see an orderly transition so that no one fills a void, that there not be a void, that there be a well thought out plan that will bring about a democratic participatory government.
"We also don't want to see some takeover that would lead not to democracy but to oppression and the end of the aspirations of the Egyptian people."
Heba Fatma Morayef, from Human Rights Watch, has sent another email update from Cairo.
At least 20,000 protesters in Tahrir square now, it's absolutlely packed. Two fighter jets have been flying overhead for the last 10 minutes - people are cheering the flyovers.
They're chanting "we will not leave until he leaves" and "long live the crescent together with the cross." There are judges, independent journalists, the Muslim Brotherhood, the National Association for Change, April 6th movement - all standing together and leading the chants.
More fence sitting from the US? Hillary Clinton said the Egyptian military appears to be showing restraint against protesters, according to Reuters citing an interview with ABC's This Week.
"America's message has been consistent. We want to see free and fair elections and we expect that will be one of the outcomes of what is going on right now," she said.
Asked whether Mubarak's government is stable, Clinton said, "I'm not going to get into either or choices."
Caught off guard by the escalating unrest in Egypt, the Obama administration is desperate to avoid any public appearance of taking sides. But Washington's close, longstanding political and military ties to President Hosni Mubarak's regime, plus annual financial support worth about $1.5bn, undermine its claims to neutrality.
While the US favours Egyptian political reform in theory, in practice it props up an authoritarian system for pragmatic reasons of national self-interest. It behaved in much the same way towards Saddam Hussein's regime in the 1980s, when Iraq was at war with Iran. A similar tacit bargain governs relations with Saudi Arabia. That's why, for many Egyptians, the US is part of the problem.
Heba Fatma Morayef, a researcher for Human Rights Watch, reports on the mood in the square, before the new tank unit moved in.
I'm in Tahrir Square and there must be 7,000 people already, a festive mood inside the square, families, a few with children and many women, veiled and unveiled. That shows people feel safe. People are chanting enthusiastically, "Get out!", aimed at Mubarak.
Someone strung up a large banner between two lamp-posts with their demands: that Mubarak should resign, Mubarak should be held to account for the destruction of Egypt, the Interior Minister should be prosecuted and a temporary government should be created to restore the nation and dissolve parliament.
People are holding up signs all over the square, some hand-made, some printed, all saying more or less the same thing - Down with Mubarak, the people and the Army against the enemy, stop police vandalism or police are terrorizing people. These last refer to widespread reports that some looting was carried out by police. They haven't been seen on the streets of Cairo since 6pm on Friday.
It's the first day of the working week but most shops and offices are closed. Only a few food stores are open.
"At first we trusted the army, but we don't trust them any more," protester Mohamed Ali tells Peter Beaumont as a new tank unit moves into Tahrir Square.
To listen to the audio in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
"People clearly sense that something different is going on. People feel very uncomfortable about all these tanks trying to enter the square," Peter Beaumont reports from Tahrir Square.
To listen to the audio in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
Modern US tanks are being deployed on the streets of Cairo for the first time, my colleague Peter Beaumont just told in a phone call from the streets. He counted seven as we talked. It appears to confirm rumours that some of the elite combat troops are being moved to Cairo from their units in the desert, he said.
Time for a summary:
• Thousands of protesters have returned to the streets of Cairo on the sixth day of protests. There is a heavy military presence in Tahrir square. Protesters are demanding the resignation of president Hosni Mubarak, and his newly appointed deputy Omar Suleiman. • Al-Jazeera has been taken off air in Egypt, in move that has been widely condemned as an attack on free speech. The network was also banned from showing live footage in Cairo. • The Foreign Office has advised Britons to leave Cairo, Suez and Alexandria. Many other countries, including the US, are planning evacuation flights. • There are reports of a mass prison break out. Leading members of the opposition Muslim Brotherhood were among those freed, the organisation said. Residents have taken control of law and order in many neighbourhoods. • Israel has expressed concern about stability and security in Egypt. Britain's foreign secretary, William Hague, said there was a danger of extremism taking hold.
Several countries, including the US and India, have announced plans to organise evacuation flights from Egypt. Harriet Sherwood has more:
Israel's national airline El Al made a rare Shabbat flight to Cairo yesterday to pick up the families of diplomats and stranded Israeli tourists at the request of the foreign ministry. The airline does not normally fly on the Jewish sabbath.
Today's Air Sinai flight from Tel Aviv to Cairo was cancelled. A scheduled El Al flight this evening is likely to depart according to a local travel agent, because it is turning round immediately to fly back to Tel Aviv with every seat on the return leg taken.
Turkey is also sending three planes to Cairo today to airlift its citizens, according to reports, and the US has said it will begin an evacuation programme tomorrow.
AP has this raw footage peaceful protests and chanting in central Cairo this morning.
To watch the video in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
People are only being let into Tahrir Square in central Cairo after being searched for weapons, according to a Sky News. It showed footage of people lining up to be searched in single file behind a military checkpoint on the edge of the square.
An al-Jazeera reporter describes the mood in the square:
The present regime is widely seen in Egypt as a state for the others– for the US, Israel, France and the UK– and as a state for the few– the Neoliberal nouveau riche. Islam plays no role in this analysis because it is not an independent variable. Muslim movements have served to protest the withdrawal of the state from its responsibilities, and to provide services. But they are a symptom, not the cause. All this is why Mubarak's appointment of military men as vice president and prime minister cannot in and of itself tamp down the crisis. They, as men of the System, do not have more legitimacy than does the president– and perhaps less.
Hospitals are urging people to donate blood, according to the latest email update from Human Rights Watch's emergencies director, Peter Bouckaert, in Alexandria. He has also been told of that prison break out.
Hospitals in Alexandria and Cairo are requesting that people come in and donate blood.
The Cairo-Alexandria desert road is blocked because of a prison outbreak at Wadi el-Natroun- several thousand prisoners released. The army is deployed. Residents of local villages say the prison had 8,000 inmates.
The old Cairo-Alexandria "agricultural road" is open and traffic is running smoothly. People in Menoufeyya say criminals stopping cars at night demanding money. But day travel is safe.
Mosques are being transformed into sickrooms for protesters with bullet wounds, according to this report from Jack Shenker and Peter Beaumont.
They write:
This place of worship is little more than a partially-roofed narrow passage between two tall buildings; now it has been transformed into a makeshift hospital, with blood soaking through the prayer mats. The muezzin's microphone – normally used to send out the call to prayer – pressed into use by a thick-set, bearded imam who is shouting out instructions to the medics. Occasionally, he prays.
To listen to the audio in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
34 members of the Muslim Brotherhood, including seven leaders, have escaped from prison, according to Reuters.
Relatives stormed the prison in Wadi el-Natroun, 120 km (80 miles) northwest of Cairo, and set free several thousand of the inmates, Brotherhood office manager Mohamed Osama told Reuters. No one was hurt, he added.
At the moment, the Muslim Brotherhood is playing catch-up with a young, leaderless protest movement. But chaos always opens opportunities and years of oppression by the government has angered and frustrated ordinary people. The brotherhood has enormous support among the poor, encouraged by the network of charities it runs. Observers have been debating the sincerity of the brotherhood's apparent moves towards real political reform, and point to its inability to directly challenge Mubarak's government.
Thousands of prisoners have escaped from jail in the Wadi Naturn prison, north of Cairo, according to AP.
Australia's Herald Sun has this AP report:
Inmates overwhelmed guards during the night, breaking out of the facility which holds many Islamist political prisoners, and spilling out into nearby towns and villages, as nationwide riots demanding the end of the regime gave way to looting.
It cited a "security official" for the information.
6,000 prisoners escape from #Abu Zaabel prison #egypt #jan25 (via phone)
The US is offering its citizens evacuation flights out of Egypt.
"The US Embassy in Cairo informs U.S. citizens in Egypt who wish to depart that the Department of State is making arrangements to provide transportation to safehaven locations in Europe," a statement said, according to Reuters.
The evacuation flights will start tomorrow.
The Foreign Office is advising Britons to leave Cairo, Alexandria and Suez, Britain's foreign secretary William Hague told Sky News.
He also talked of the danger of "extremism" taking hold in Egypt. "There is a great danger of violence running out of control," he said.
Hague also urged the Egyptian government to show restraint and to allow freedom of expression. He condemned the closure of al-Jazeera's bureau in Cairo.
We advise against all but essential travel to Cairo, Alexandria, Luxor and Suez. We recommend that British nationals without a pressing need to be in Cairo, Alexandria or Suez leave by commercial means where it is safe to do so. British nationals in other areas of Egypt where there are demonstrations should follow the advice below and stay indoors wherever possible.
Al-Jazeera has this video report on the efforts of Cairo residents to maintain order in the city.
To watch the video in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
Rumours have been circulating that the army will take a much tougher line with protesters today – what some are calling the Tiananmen Square option. However, I am sceptical about that. For one, thing, the US has warned strongly against it, and though Mubarak may not listen to Washington I think his commanders are more likely to.
There are more signs of Israeli nervousness, following those comments by Netanyahu. Our Jerusalem correspondent, Harriet Sherwood reports:
Israel Army Radio said this morning that the Israeli military is preparing for the possibility that militants in Gaza may take advantage of the chaos in Egypt to bring in weapons from the Sinai.
Meanwhile, it's being reported in Gaza that three Palestinian prisoners being held in Al-Arish jail in Egypt have escaped and made their way back to Gaza through the tunnels.
The Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt has been closed until further notice, a Hamas official said.
Al Jazeera has denounced the closure of its Cairo bureau. In a statement it said:
Al-Jazeera sees this as an act designed to stifle and repress the freedom of reporting by the network and its journalists. In this time of deep turmoil and unrest in Egyptian society it is imperative that voices from all sides be heard; the closing of our bureau by the Egyptian government is aimed at censoring and silencing the voices of the Egyptian people...
Al Jazeera Network is appalled at this latest attack by the Egyptian regime to strike at its freedom to report independently on the unprecedented events in Egypt."
The government plans to shut down al-Jazeera's operations in Egypt, according to Reuters, citing the state news agency Mana.
"The information minister ordered ... suspension of operations of al-Jazeera, cancelling of its licences and withdrawing accreditation to all its staff as of today," a statement said.
The station was the first to report that the governing party's headquarters were set on fire. Breathless phone reports came in from Jazeera correspondents in towns across Egypt. Live footage from Cairo alternated with action shots that played again and again. Orchestral music played, conveying the sense of a long-awaited drama.
Al Jazeera kept up its coverage despite serious obstacles. The broadcaster's separate live channel was removed from its satellite platform by the Egyptian government on Friday morning, its Cairo bureau had its telephones cut and its main news channel also faced signal interference, according to a statement released by the station. The director of the live channel issued an appeal to the Egyptian government to allow it to broadcast freely.
The Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has expressed concern about "stability and security" in the region, in his first comments on the Egyptian unrest.
Photograph: Reuters "We are following with vigilance the events in Egypt and in our region ... at this time we must show responsibility and restraint and maximum consideration. Our efforts have been intended to continue to preserve stability and security in our region.
"I remind you that the peace between Israel and Egypt has lasted for over three decades."
He claims it is the people who are mobilising to maintain order, while plain clothes policeman try to create the impression of anarchy.
The military has blocked Tahrir Square, Jack reports. "The army and the people are on one hand," protesters are chanting in an attempt to stand with the military. To listen to the audio in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page "I am with you," an officer told the crowd last night, Jack said.
Protesters are shaking hands with soldiers in Tahrir Square, according to this audio clips which purports to have been recorded today. The speaker predicts more people will take to the streets today.
To listen to the audio in full turn off auto refresh at the top of the page
On the sixth day of protests, more than 1,000 people gathered in central, Cairo this morning, demanding the resignation of president Hosni Mubarak and his newly appointed deputy.
In a bid to cling to power Mubarak appointed his intelligence chief and confidant, Omar Suleiman, as his vice president and possible successor yesterday.
The appointment is seen as an attempt to continue Egypt's military leadership. "This is a way of paving the way for a military-led regime in a so-called constitutional context. It is clearly the result of negotiations with the army," Ragui Assaad, a professor at the University of Minnesota told the New York Times.
Suleiman has become a new target for protesters. "Hosni Mubarak, Omar Suleiman, both of you are agents of the Americans," they shouted this morning. "Mubarak, Mubarak, the plane awaits," the demonstrators also chanted. Activist Hossam Hareedy, told the Guardian: "We want to get rid of a tyrant. Firing the cabinet was not what we had in mind. What we want is for Mubarak to be cut down."
Overnight "vigilante groups" took to the streets to the guard neighbourhoods against looting after police disappeared from the streets, according to Reuters.
There is a propaganda war over the nature of the unrest. The regime is trying to portray the protesters as thugs - arrested looters were paraded on state TV last night. Protesters point out that residents are intervening to stop the looting.
Opposition supporters urged the media against portraying the situation as anarchy, as they claim this plays into the regime's hand.
The differing media treatment of the protests is reflected in today's front pages. The Sunday's Telegraph's splashes with "Bloodshed on the streets". It lead story starts: "The full horror of Egypt's political convulsions has emerged, as relatives gathered at morgues filled with bodies and doctors described their heroic efforts to save the wounded."
