As petty arguments increasingly lead to gunfire on village streets, the implications for the elections are worrying, Mohamed Abdel-Baky reports Military and security forces are struggling to restore order in Upper Egypt amid a spate of armed clashes between feuding clans which has left 14 people -- including one Canadian -- dead, and many injured. Outbreaks of violence over the Eid Al-Adha holiday saw a curfew imposed on two villages -- Awlad Yehia and Awlad Khalifa -- in Sohag governorate. The problem, say residents, began on Sunday when a fight broke out in a cemetery between two boys while their families were paying visits to relatives' graves. The boys' families became involved and by Monday were shooting at each other. Residents from the more populous Awlad Yehia then blocked access to the village's smaller neighbour, preventing food and bottled gas from entering. One person was shot dead on Monday, two more on Wednesday. Sohag Governor Major General Waddah El-Hamzawi has formed a committee to investigate the circumstances leading to the violence and to promote reconciliation between the villagers. The committee includes local public figures, former MPs and clerics. In Qena clashes broke out between residents of Al-Ashraf and Asmant villages. In the ensuing gunfights four people were killed and 20 injured. Clans from the two villages embarked on a series of tit-for-tat kidnappings. Eventually Al-Arab clan members from Asmant blocked the Cairo- Aswan Western highway, forcing all cars to stop and checking the IDs of drivers. Any members of the rival Al-Ashraf clan were detained. A Canadian tourist died after being shot in the chest when his taxi failed to stop at the checkpoint. He was taken to Luxor International Hospital where he underwent surgery and died shortly afterwards. In Aswan on Sunday hundreds of people set the fire of a police station and attacked the Police Club after a police officer shot dead a felucca owner following an argument. In the town of Baltim, in the Delta governorate of Kafr Al-Sheikh, three people were killed and 70 were injured in yet another inter-village dispute. An argument between two drivers developed into a gun battle that involved hundreds of people. Calm was restored after intensive mediation efforts and the involvement of the governor and military officials, but only after the violence had raged for more than a week. Political groups and youth movements point out that such incidents throw serious doubts over the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces' claim that is capable of securing the election process, due to kick off on 18 November. It is the imminent election, argues lawyer and activist Mokhtar Nouh, that is lending impetus to such clashes. He accuses the government and SCAF of playing politics with existing social tensions in an attempt to promote their political agendas rather than attempting to resolve the conflicts. They are, he says, doing exactly what the Mubarak regime did. The violence in Upper Egypt, he says, cannot be divorced from the elections, and is indicative of the way powerful families are planning to defend their influence and consolidate their positions politically. What makes Nouh's arguments particularly chilling is that Egypt has never been so awash with weapons. "In Assiut families are preparing for the elections by buying weapons for their kids and employees. Rifles and shotguns, Russian or European made, are really easy to get," says Mohamed Nasser, a member of a powerful Assiut clan. Most of the weapons, he says, come via arm smugglers from Libya. Family arsenals now include not just small arms, but automatic weapons that were impossible to obtain before the revolution. It is an assessment that is supported by at least one Youtube video in which a wedding in Sohag is celebrated by men firing rounds from a variety of automatic weapons, including Kalashnikovs.
