Thousands spend another night in Tahrir

CAIRO: Thousands of Egyptians emerged from sleeping bags on Saturday after spending another night in Cairo's Tahrir Square, where protesters have vowed to stay put until their demand of civilian rule is met.

Dozens of tents have been pitched in the square, the epicentre of protests that toppled Hosni Mubarak in February and saw the country headed by a military junta.

A rubbish collection station was set up, and street vendors roamed the square in a sign that protesters were settling in for the long haul.

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, headed by Mubarak's long time defence minister Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, has pledged to hand power to a civilian president who will be elected no later than June 2012.

But the Tahrir protesters want the immediate transfer of power to a transitional civilian government.

Banners read "Down down with military rule" and "The people want a revolutionary national salvation government."

The sit-in entered its eighth day on Saturday, following days of deadly clashes pitting demonstrators against police.

On Friday, SCAF said it tasked ex-premier Kamal al-Ganzuri to head the new cabinet.

But the appointment failed to placate the protesters who have been touting several names, including former UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei, to lead the country to democratic rule.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011