CAIRO: Egyptian police fought protesters in two cities in eastern Egypt Thursday and prominent reform campaigner Mohamed ElBaradei headed back to the country to join demonstrators. Police fired rubber bullets, water cannon and tear gas at hundreds of demonstrators in the eastern city of Suez, on a third day of protests. Across the eastern city of Ismailia, hundreds of protesters clashed with police, who dispersed the crowds with tear gas. ElBaradei told Reuters before he left Vienna for Egypt to join in demonstrations. “Tomorrow is going to be, I think, a major demonstration all over Egypt and I will be there with them,” ElBaradei, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning former head of the UN nuclear agency, said. ElBaradei's arrival could spur protesters who have no figurehead, although many activists resent his absences in recent months. Interior Minister Habib al-Adli, whose resignation is being demanded by the protesters, has dismissed the demonstrations. “Egypt's system is not marginal or frail. We are a big state, with an administration with popular support. The millions will decide the future of this nation, not demonstrations even if numbered in the thousands,” he told Kuwait's al-Rai newspaper. “Our country is stable and not shaken by such actions.”
