EGYPT'S president has signed a new bill into law restricting rallies and other public gatherings, a move likely to raise fresh questions about the army-backed government's democratic credentials.
Thousands of anti-government protesters were on the streets of Cairo and other cities when the new bill was announced on state media, as they have been regularly in the nearly three years since autocrat Hosni Mubarak was ousted.
The new legislation will reportedly require them to get advance permission from the police before gathering in the future.
President Adli Mansour's approval of the law came as a committee prepared to vote on an amended constitution that will be put to a referendum expected in coming months. Parliamentary and presidential elections are due next year.
Rights groups had urged Mr Mansour to reject the draft presented to him by the cabinet installed after the army overthrew Mr Mubarak's successor, Islamist Mohamed Mursi, in July.
"The draft law seeks to criminalise all forms of peaceful assembly, including demonstrations and public meetings," a statement by 19 Egyptian organisations said.
Thousands of supporters of Mr Mursi and his Muslim Brotherhood demonstrated in several cities yesterday, marking 100 days since security forces crushed two pro-Mursi sit-ins in Cairo, killing hundreds. Police fired tear gas to disperse some of the demonstrations.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article