The District Attorney in the Abdeen neighborhood of Cairo ordered Tuesday the release of five Nile University students who were detained after clashes with security forces.
Security officers forcibly broke up a sit-in on Monday held by Nile University students at the Zewail City of Science and Technology campus, arresting five of the demonstrators.
Since late August, Nile University students had been protesting the public prosecutor’s decision to hand the campus over to Nobel Laureate Ahmed Zewail. The demonstrators claimed that the Nile University administration had paid LE62 million for the right to use the campus for 99 years, and demanded that their campus remain in Zewail City and that they be allowed to use its laboratories and facilities.
The forcible break-up of the protest has outraged a number os political groups, parties and public figures, who described it as a return to oppressive police practices against peaceful protest.
