Egyptian activist's family call for Tahrir Square protest against military trials

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/17/egyptian-activist-tahrir-square-military-trials


Egyptians in Cairo protest against the ruling military council, this November, in support of jailed blogger Alaa Abdel Fattah. Photograph: Amr Nabil/AP

Laila Soueif sits beneath a blackboard chalked with mathematical formulae on the teeming campus of Cairo university. It is the 10th day of her hunger strike in support of her imprisoned son.

She claims to be "feeling fine, really no different" – but all the 55-year-old maths professor and soon to be grandmother has consumed since 6 November is sugarless tea and rehydration salts intended for infants.

"Of course, I'm not behaving in the same way," she says. "Normally I would be on demonstrations every day, but now I'm just sitting and conserving my energy."

Her protest will continue, she says, until her son Alaa Abdel Fattah, a blogger, revolutionary and "thorn in the backside of the military", is released from prison, where he has been since 30 October.