Egypt Follow

Hundreds of thousands of workers have taken action over the past week to defend the revolution and demand radical changes in their pay and working conditions.

Some 1,000 workers from the Egyptian-American Steel company in Sadat City sat in for the second day on Monday over wages, health insurance and meal incentives.

For the past two decades socialist and opposition groups in Egypt, including the Muslim Brotherhood, have suffered fierce repression.

Since Tunisia’s revolution began in December, people across North Africa and the Middle East have risen up against their regimes. They are inspired by Tunisia and Egypt, where two dictators were toppled in the last few weeks.

Thousands of people took to Trafalgar Square in central London today, Saturday, the day after Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak finally stepped down. People sang, chanted and danced to celebrate the fact that Egypt’s 30-year old dictatorship was over.

5.30pm, Sunday 13 February

At the start of the protests some asked: how could the Egyptian people even dream to take on the strongest, oldest, most brutal state in the Arab world?

Dictators are the last to understand the people when they wake up.

All up and down the Edgware Road the protest grew on Friday evening. Cars and buses honked, some with Egyptian flags. Staff and customers poured out of shops, cafes and restaurants to join this utterly jubilant crowd. There were smiles everywhere.

'Egyptians have put a page in the history books Sameh, an Egyptian socialist, spoke to Socialist Worker from Cairo on Friday evening:

Mohammed, a Tunisian socialist living in Britain, spoke to Socialist Worker minutes after Mubarak announced he was standing down:

Middle Eastern "peace" envoy, Tony Blair: