A series of demonstrations to mark the anniversary of the Egyptian military coup d’etat that removed the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi from the presidency turned violent, and small bombs were set off.  Egyptian police arrested nearly 200 people in its ongoing crackdown on the Islamists.

Billed as a “day of rage”, Islamists started off with protests, and ceded the streets to those with rocks and smoke bombs.  They faced off against troops with tear gas and actual weapons. 

A year ago, hundreds of thousands of people rejoiced when the military escorted Morsi from office, because they were upset with his focus on tightening religious restrictions on society while he ignored the economy.  Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood was eventually outlawed.

But a year later, the economy is still shambles and the human rights situation has deteriorated.  Amnesty International says new President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s Egypt has was “failing at every level in terms of human rights,” citing “harrowing incidents of torture and deaths in police custody”.  The report says at least 16,000 people have been detained in the last year alone as part of the government’s bid to silence Morsi’s supporters.  Eighty of the detainees have died in custody.

One prisoner settling in to the grim situation is Aussie journalist Peter Greste, whose parents were finally able to pay their first visit to him in Egypt following his conviction of incredibly bogus charges of spreading false news and supporting the blacklisted Muslim Brotherhood.

Juris Greste told ABC News the experience was “horrendous”; he was his wife Lois thought they’d get to visit Peter for two hours, but were cut off at 45 minutes; and that Peter’s mood was “very, very somber”.