CAIRO, Jan 23, 2013 (AFP)
Key events in Egypt, two years after the beginning of the popular uprising which led to the fall of Hosni Mubarak’s regime after 30 years in power:
–2011–
JANUARY
– 25: Egypt protests erupt, involving thousands of demonstrators, after a revolt topples Tunisia’s ruler. The protests, which are centred in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, gather more than a million people across the country on February 1.
FEBRUARY
– 11: After daily protests Mubarak resigns and hands power to the army led by Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi. About 850 people die in the unrest.
– 12: Promising a peaceful transition to democracy, the army suspends the constitution and dissolves parliament.
MARCH
– 19: Egyptians widely approve a new constitution.
APRIL
– 13: Authorities say Mubarak is being held in a hospital in Sharm el-Sheikh.
JUNE
– 28-29: More than 1,000 hurt as protesters and police clash in Tahrir Square.
NOVEMBER
– 19: Start of week-long clashes between police and anti-military demonstrators that leave 42 dead.
– 28: Egypt holds the first stage of its first post-revolt parliamentary election. Islamist parties win about two-thirds of the seats, of which half go to the Muslim Brotherhood.
–2012–
FEBRUARY
– 1: Riots kill 74 people after a Port Said football match.
JUNE
– 2: Mubarak and his former interior minister Habib al-Adly sentenced to life in prison for the deaths of protesters during the revolt, while six police commanders are acquitted.
– 30: Mohammad Morsi, who won the presidential election with 51.7 percent of the vote, is sworn in, becoming Egypt’s first civilian and Islamist ruler.
AUGUST
– 5: Gunmen kill 16 guards in Egypt near the border with Israel before crossing into the Jewish state. Israel says five gunmen were killed on its side.
– 12: Morsi scraps a constitutional document which handed sweeping powers to the military and ousts Tantawi.
NOVEMBER
– 22: Morsi decrees sweeping new powers for himself.
– 23: Protests erupt against what the opposition terms Morsi’s “power grab”.
– 30: Islamist-dominated constituent assembly adopts the draft constitution after a process boycotted by liberals and Christians.
DECEMBER
– 8: Morsi annuls the decree giving himself sweeping powers, but maintains a controversial referendum on the constitution.
– 15 and 22: 64 percent of voters in the two-round referendum back the new constitution, after a vote which the opposition says is tainted.
Egypt plunges into a deep political crisis, with demonstrations by supporters and opponents of Morsi turning into sometimes deadly clashes.
–2013–
JANUARY
– 6: Morsi reshuffles his cabinet amid a serious economic crisis.
– 13: An Egyptian court orders a retrial for Mubarak after accepting an appeal against his life sentence.
– 21: Morsi says he opposes French-led military action in Mali against Islamist rebels.
