http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/17/9524942-whos-in-charge-mixed-signals-from-egypts-rulers CAIRO -- The echo from the microphones in the room where the prime minister had just finished his press conference on Saturday morning was still ringing in everyone's ears.
Could he have been right?
Prime Minister Kamal Ghanzoury looked journalists, and by extension the Egyptian people, square in the eye and told them the military and the police were not involved in the clashes on Friday -- and if they were, they were only acting in self-defense.
He went on to add that the military exercised restraint and did not fire on the crowds.
But even more surprising to many activists, Ghanzoury said the people involved in Friday's clashes were not revolutionaries.
The three-weeklong peaceful protests outside his office turned violent Friday when, according to him, troublemakers attacked the military.
His depiction was an attempt, protesters felt, to taint them and their sit-in.
Ghanzoury's comments contradicted widespread reports and eyewitness accounts from journalists and activists.
