really evident now. the rioters and the protesters are easily able to overrun the police in many of these areas. that s why the military was deployed in port sayeed, and that s where the president has declared a state of emergency. that s also going to be a great tremendous concern for human rights organizations and the political opposition in this country. the other track that i was talking about was that there is a political intransigence between opposition members, the protests, and the government. the government and president morsi believe they have a democratic mandate to govern. the constitution was passed with a majority. those pro-testing and the political opposition say that now mohammed morsi is trying to overrun the government and trying to push through his agenda at the expense of a more pluralistic and democratic egypt. amman, let s talk about the piece here, the riot and the massacre and the soccer. i think a lot of folks don t understand exactly what went down there. 7
concluded that 21 people, 21 defendants, were sentenced to death. now, the families of those 21 people are saying this is not justice. that completely what happened on saturday was just a ad hoc trial, sham trial. that s why they took to the streets and clashed with police, and another 30 people in port sayeed were killed. it really highlights how everything in this country now has become political. even sporting matches or sporting events, but it also really sheds light into how the government here is really struggling in trying to just function on a very basic level. maintaining security at a soccer game and those that are arguing, no, there is something more sinister here. there is a counter revolutionary force working to undermine security and make those who participated in the revolution two years ago pay a very heavy price for ousting the former dictator. i want to bring in our panel really quick here, sam. we played some sound of the president talking about egypt along side hi
soccer gam between port sayeed and cairo. op sfligs forces have said that wasn t just a sporting event gone very, very wrong, but there was an ulterior motive there. can you explain that a little bit to us? reporter: sure. absolutely. we kind of have to go back to the event itself, which began last we re. it was a soccer game that was back in february of last we re. essentially what happened during the game, it was a very violent scene as riders clashed with one another and essentially killing 74 people. many people across egypt in a fact-finding commission found out that this was not a spontaneous outburst of sports violence. this was not just some fan on fan violence. they concluded that there was a conspiracy to attack the visiting fans, and it s important to emphasize that the team that was participating and their fans that were killed were those that were involved in the revolution. they are a group of youth activists that were at the forefront of the revolution, and it gave the
a new front in the battle for the republican presidential nomination, nevada, which holds its caucuses this coming saturday. mitt romney is there along with newt gingrich and ron paul. instead of relishing his victory, a huge victory in the florida primary last night, romney and his team are now in full damage control mode after something romney said right here on cnn. our senior congressional correspondent dana bash is in las vegas with us. she s watching what s going on. what s going on with mitt romney, dana? reporter: well, wolf, i think we ve auld had something like this happen to us. you say something, it doesn t quite come out like you mean it, but when you re the front-runner in a presidential campaign, you can t afford to be the one who trips yourself up. making the morning show rounds, mitt romney inadvertently handed opponents an eight-word give on cnn i m not concerned about the very poor reporter: to be clear that made for a bumper sticker line was only
the team in port sayeed wasn t very happy about it this kind of incident is something that could set egypt once again down a path of uncontrolled violence. seen on egyptian state tv the players and fans ran for their lives as a crowd took over the soccer field. they ran, however, into a locked gate. where witnesses say fans faced certain death, either by suffocation as they were crushed in the narrow exit tunnel or faced the enraged crowd armed with knives and spears. i swear to god i saw people being thrown off the stadium steps said this fan who attended the game in port sayeed. local fans rushed field when their team won against visitors from cairo. at some point stadium officials shut off the lights which turned darkened corridors into a killing field. witnesses said police stood by overwhelmed or joined in. as survivors returned to cairo by train, fellow fans treated them chanting we will get their rights or die