1 of 25. A protester throws a Molotov cocktail (petrol bomb) at riot police during clashes along a road which leads to the Interior Ministry, near Tahrir Square in Cairo November 23, 2011. 
 
 CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian riot police fired barrages of tear gas at hardcore protesters demanding Egypt's army relinquish power in a sixth night of violence which has led the interior minister, according to one report, to propose postponing elections due on November 28. 
 
 Scores of young men, coughing and gasping for air stumbled into dark side streets off Cairo's Tahrir Square to escape the acrid smoke during the to-and-fro battle with police. 
 
 But undeterred, tens of thousands still thronged the square peacefully late into the night on Wednesday to protest at the deaths of more than 30 people in the violence and reject the army's offer of a referendum on its rule. 
 
 In light of the violence, Interior Minister Mansour el-Essawy presented a report to the military council proposing a postponement of the parliamentary election planned for November 28, Al Jazeera television said on Thursday, quoting unnamed sources. It was not immediately possible to verify the report. 
 
 The election, due to begin on Monday, has been billed as Egypt's first free vote in decades. 
 
 The army and the Muslim Brotherhood, which expects to do well in the election, says it must go ahead but many protesters are unwilling to trust the army to oversee a clean vote and hand real control of the country to the winner. 
 
 The generals' popularity has waned in the nine months since they nudged President Hosni Mubarak from office and swore to steer the country toward civilian democracy, as suspicion grew that they were manoeuvring to stay in power beyond elections. 
 
 The head of the military council, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, has pledged to bring forward a presidential vote and offered a new interim government but the demonstrators are unconvinced. 
 
 "The military council must leave and hand power to civilians. They don't want to leave so that their corruption isn't exposed," said 23-year-old student Ahmed Essam. 
 
 He said he joined the protests when he saw riot police raining blows on peaceful demonstrators on Saturday. "Everything is like in Mubarak's time," he said. 
 
 DEATHS 
 
 Gunfire rattled near the Interior Ministry, a symbol of state authority and target of the protesters, on Wednesday night. Several gave accounts of people shot dead but these could not immediately be verified. 
 
 At a makeshift clinic near Tahrir, doctor Tareq Salem said four people had died there on Wednesday, two from bullet wounds and two from asphyxiation. 
 
 He said three volunteer doctors have been killed since the violence began. 
 
 "They were fresh graduates," he said, splashing his face with saline fluid to counter the effects of the latest barrage of gas. One died of suffocation, the other two of bullet wounds sustained while assessing injuries outside, he said. 
 
 Essawy told state television earlier that only tear gas was being fired by the security forces but there were unidentified people shooting from rooftops near Tahrir. 
 
 Thousands turned out in the second city of Alexandria and in Port Said. One died and two were injured in Ismailia, a city on the Suez Canal, security sources said. 
 
 Protesters accused the army of using hired thugs to buildings and paint a political protest as mindless vandalism. 
 
 TV stations showed a man being beaten in Tahrir Square after he was accused of working for state security under cover and shooting at protesters. 
 
 Ambulances, sirens wailing, ferried casualties away while smoke billowed over the area from fires lit by youths. 
 
 Gunfire rang out repeatedly, fuel-filled bottles erupted in flames and riot police filled the street in front of their main position with round after round of tear gas, driving protesters, coughing, into side streets. Every so often, the demonstrators regrouped and would again edge toward the ministry. 
 
 SURGE OF SOLIDARITY 
 
 What started as a sit-in on Saturday night has turned into a mass demonstration reminiscent of the 18-day uprising against Mubarak as Egyptians appalled at the mistreatment of protesters joined them in solidarity. 
 
 Youthful demonstrators took Tantawi's offer of a referendum on whether military rule should end earlier as a ploy to undermine their cause by appealing to Egyptians who fear further upheaval. 
 
 Many worry the unrest will prolong economic stagnation and delay any improvement in a morose business climate that has deepened the poverty of millions. 
 
 Those that did join the protest said it is always better to take a stand. 
 
 "I want to have a better life and feel safe. Since the military council took power, it has been worse," said protester Abdel Salam Roshdy. 
 
 Nader el Sayed, a former goal keeper of Egypt's national football team, led protesters in Tahrir chanting: "The blood of the martyrs won't be for free." 
 
 Protesters unfurled a huge sign denouncing Tantawi, who was Mubarak's defense minister for two decades, and his deputy Sami Enan, along with the rest of the ruling SCAF military council. 
 
 "Down, down with military rule. We the people are the red line. The people want to bring down the field marshal, Sami Enan and the military council," it read. 
 
 The overall death toll has reached 39 by a Reuters count. One man was killed in Alexandria and another died in what the state news agency MENA said was an attack on a police station in the northern town of Marsa Matrouh. 
 
 The Health Ministry said 32 people had been killed and 2,000 wounded in disturbances across the country of 80 million. 
 
 Egypt's currency dipped to its lowest level in almost seven years on Wednesday and the yield on an Egyptian dollar bond soared to its highest since March, suggesting that investors are unconvinced that stability will return soon. 
 
 (Additional reporting by Ali Abdel Atti and Yousri Mohamed; Writing by Tom Pfeiffer; Editing by Jon Hemming) ||||| An Egyptian boy holds two Molotov cocktails during clashes with Egyptian riot police, unseen, in Cairo, Egypt, Wednesday, Nov. 23, 2011. Egyptian police are clashing with anti-government protesters for... (Associated Press) 
 
 Egyptian police clashed with anti-government protesters for a fifth day in central Cairo Wednesday as a rights group raised the overall death toll from the ongoing unrest to at least 38. The United Nations strongly condemned what it called the use of excessive force by security forces. 
 
 The clashes resumed despite a promise by Egypt's military ruler to speed up a presidential election to the first half of next year, a concession swiftly rejected by tens of thousands of protesters in Tahrir Square. The military previously floated late next year or early 2013 as the likely date for the vote, the last step in the process of transferring power to a civilian government. 
 
 The standoff has plunged the country deeper into crisis less than a week before parliamentary elections, the first since the ouster nine months ago of longtime authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak. 
 
 Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi tried to defuse tensions with his address late Tuesday, but he did not set a date for handing authority to a civilian government, instead offering a referendum on the immediate return of the armed forces to their barracks. 
 
 The Tahrir crowd, along with protesters in a string of other cities across the nation, want Tantawi to step down immediately in favor of an interim civilian council to run the nation's affairs until elections for a new parliament and president are held. 
 
 Street battles have centered around the heavily fortified Interior Ministry, near the iconic square, with police and army troops using tear gas and rubber bullets to keep the protesters from storming the ministry, a sprawling complex that has for long been associated with the hated police and Mubarak's former regime. 
 
 The protesters, who have withstood tear gas and beatings, say they have no wish to storm the ministry but were trying to keep the police and army from moving on Tahrir Square. 
 
 Elnadeem Center, an Egyptian rights group known for its careful research of victims of police violence, said late Tuesday that the number of protesters killed in clashes nationwide since Saturday is 38, nine more than the Health Ministry's death toll. The clashes also have left at least 2,000 protesters wounded, mostly from gas inhalation or injuries caused by rubber bullets fired by the army and the police. The police deny using live ammunition. 
 
 Shady el-Nagar, a doctor in one of Tahrir's field hospitals, said three bodies arrived in the facility on Wednesday. All three had bullet wounds. "We don't know if these were caused by live ammunition or pellets because pellets can be deadly when fired from a short distance," he said. 
 
 Navi Pillay, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, deplored the role of Egypt's military and security forces in attempting to suppress protesters during the ongoing unrest. 
 
 "Some of the images coming out of Tahrir, including the brutal beating of already subdued protesters, are deeply shocking, as are the reports of unarmed protesters being shot in the head," Pillay said. "There should be a prompt, impartial and independent investigation, and accountability for those found responsible for the abuses that have taken place should be ensured." 
 
 She said the actions of the military and police were inflaming the situation, prompting more people to join the protests. "The more they see fellow protesters being carted away in ambulances, the more determined and energized they become." 
 
 The five days of clashes are the longest spate of uninterrupted violence since the 18-day uprising that toppled the former regime in February, deepening the country's economic and security woes. the unrest also threatens to cloud the country's first post-Mubarak parliamentary elections, which are scheduled to begin on Monday. 
 
 In his address, Tantawi rejected all criticism of the military's handling of the transitional period and sought to cast himself and the generals on the military council he heads as the nation's foremost patriots. Significantly, he did not mention the protesters gathered in Tahrir Square or elsewhere in the country. 
 
 The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's strongest and best organized group, is not taking part in the ongoing protests in a move that is widely interpreted to be a reflection of its desire not to do anything that could derail a parliamentary election it is sure to dominate. 
 
 Hundreds of Brotherhood supporters, however, have defied the leadership and joined the crowds on the square. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writer Frank Jordans contributed to this report from Geneva.
– Protesters in Egypt have held on to Tahrir Square after the latest round of clashes with police, which in three days have left 22 dead throughout the country. Police burned banners and assaulted a field hospital in a raid beginning last night; protesters threw pieces of pavement at authorities; and in unconfirmed Internet videos, protesters were beaten with sticks by police, who appeared to toss a body on a heap of trash. An apparent fire in a nearby apartment building left a woman calling for help, but police shot tear gas at those below, Reuters reports. Though demonstrators were temporarily driven from the square yesterday, they soon returned ahead of another police raid, and the Los Angeles Times reports their ranks grew to 20,000 by midnight. The unrest may complicate the country's plan to hold its first free parliamentary elections in decades; the staggered vote is due to begin next Monday, though Reuters notes that the army will retain its hold on presidential powers until a presidential poll is held, which may not happen until about a year from now; protesters object to that timeline.