At least 400 people have been wounded and seven have been killed in the street clashes between anti-government protesters and police and military forces in Egypt.

The figures are reported by international media and have not been confirmed officially. On Friday, Egypt saw the most massive street demonstrations since the bread riots in 1977, and perhaps the greatest domestic challenge for the regime of President Hosni Mubarak, who has been in power since 1981.  

After earlier on Friday, Mubarak introduced a curfew for Cairo, Suez, and Alexandria, later the same day the president made the curfew nation-wide in an attempt to reign in the intensifying protests.  

The Egyptian government appears to have disabled almost all Internet connectivity with the rest of the world. The block appears to affect Egypt's four largest ISPs, responsible for most of the country's Internet connectivity: Link Egypt, Vodafone/Raya, Telecom Egypt, and Etisalat Misr.

The Internet blockade on part of the Mubarak regime appears to be unprecedented as even the civil unrest in Iran in June 2009 did not lead to outright blocking of Internet traffic, nor did the unrest in Tunisia earlier in January 2011, points out a report of Ars Technica.

As mass anti-government protests continued to spread in Egypt on Friday, the major opposition figure – former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency Mohamed El Baradei was arrested and then placed under house arrest.

Since demonstrations began in Egypt on Tuesday, at least 1 000 people have been arrested, according to Der Spiegel. The German media points out that observers' views that it is unlikely that Mubarak's regime will topple as readily as that of Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who fled his country earlier this month following mass protests.

The opposition Muslim Brotherhood has also supported the protests. The Islamist group stated Friday that five leaders and five former members of parliament had been arrested. The Egyptian government announced a nightfall curfew across the country, but demonstrators appeared to be ignoring it as evening progressed. Mubarak announced that he was going to address the nation on Friday evening.