Former MP Mostafa Bakry said on Tuesday that the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has sent him to Qena as part of a delegation aiming negotiate with demonstrators there.

The demonstrators have been protesting for six consecutive days, demanding the replacement of their newly appointed Coptic governor, Emad Mikhail, with another candidate who is Muslim.

Army troops stood before the governor’s office to protect him. They used megaphones to call on the demonstrators to leave.

Thousands of demonstrators blocked the Qena-Safaga and Qena-Aswan highways, and all exists and entries of the city. They also blocked the railway tracks leading to the city.

Interior Minister Mansour al-Essawy and Local Development Minister Mohsen al-Nomaany had promised the demonstrators to relay their demands to the military council after they failed to bring an end to the protests.

The demonstrators threatened to cut off the water pipelines and the electricity supplies that feed the Red Sea area if their demands are not met.

Al-Nomaany told the demonstrators that the government is studying the decentralization of the governorates with a view to transferring their administration to the residents, while al-Essawy asked them to turn a new page in their relationship with the police.

Translated from the Arabic Edition