Egypt fears return of students, postpones new academic term

The Egyptian Ministry of Education will likely postpone the academic term for one more week after postponing it twice, ministry sources told Egyptian news media. However, counter reports from the same ministry pointed out that the decision would only include Al-Azhar University.

The conflicting reports point to the ministry’s fears of a new wave of anti-coup protests by university students, which claimed the lives of tens of Al-Azhar and Cairo University students in the previous academic term due to the security forces’ use of excessive force inside University campuses.

Al-Azhar students have lost at least 100 colleagues in the bloody dispersal of Rabaa sit-in in August 14, 2013. Tens others have been killed and wounded when security forces repeatedly stormed the University campus to suppress anti-coup protests in the past few months.