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U.S. airlines have started rolling back last month’s fare increases, so passengers are likely to pay the same prices even though federal ticket taxes are being collected again.

Southwest Airlines Co. said Monday it cut fares back to where they were before July 23, when the taxes expired.

A spokesman for Delta Air Lines Inc. said his airline matched the move by Southwest and its AirTran Airways subsidiary. Industry observers said that they expect other airlines to do the same.

If that happens consumers will pay the same total price instead of seeing increases of around 10 percent on many tickets for travel within the U.S.

American Airlines and JetBlue Airways officials said they had lowered fares on some routes _ likely those where they compete with Southwest. Representatives for other airlines did not immediately comment.

Most U.S. airlines raised fares last month after a standoff between Republicans and Democrats in Congress on funding for the Federal Aviation Administration caused federal excise taxes on tickets to expire. In effect, the airlines grabbed the money that previously went to the government instead of passing the tax break to consumers.

Last week Congress revived the taxes through Sept. 16. The dispute forced the FAA to furlough 4,000 employees and stop work on airport projects that employed thousands of construction workers.

Bad news for workers was good news for the airlines. By raising fares to offset the expired taxes, airlines were able to pocket an estimated $400 million in just two weeks.

Rick Seaney, CEO of FareCompare.com, said Southwest and AirTran started rolling back the July fare increases on Sunday night and he expected other airlines to quickly do the same. Delta said it matched Southwest on Monday morning.

Tom Parsons, CEO of Bestfares.com, said the weak economy and stock market turmoil could force airlines to do more than just cancel last month’s fare hike.

“They have to be concerned over (travel demand in) the fall,” he said. “They may still have to bring fares down further.”

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A confused cockpit crew without proper training to head off high-altitude disaster flew toward it, instead, with wrong-headed maneuvers, no task-sharing and perhaps unaware their flight was about to end in the Atlantic Ocean.

Screeching stall alarms and incoherent speed readings from faulty sensors, bad weather in a darkened sky and growing stress make up the chaotic cockpit scenario in the final moments of the Air France flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris on June 1, 2009. All 228 people aboard the plane were killed.

Friday’s third report by France’s accident investigation agency, or BEA, lays out almost second-by-second technical data on the flight’s deadly trajectory but cannot answer the ultimate question _ whether pilot error, equipment failure or other still unknown factors caused the crash.

The BEA’s findings raised worrisome questions about the reactions of the cockpit crew _ two co-pilots _ as the A330 went into an aerodynamic stall and their ability to fly the A330 manually as the autopilot disengaged. The report expressed broader concern about the state of training of today’s pilots flying high-tech planes when confronted with a high-altitude crisis.

BEA officials said they are bringing together a bevy of experts, from psychologists to physiologists, to try to reconstitute the scene from the crews’ point of view _ the human factor which could include potential disorientation. Those findings would be included in the final report expected early next year.

Many of the crews’ actions “seem contrary to logic and we’re seeking rational explanations,” chief BEA investigator Alain Bouillard told a news conference, adding that the cockpit crew even seemed unaware the plane had gone into an aerodynamic stall.

“We understood how the accident came about,” Bouillard said. “Now we must learn why it came about.”

Friday’s 117-page report, based on a full reading and analysis of the flight and data recorders dredged from the ocean depths, recommends mandatory training for all pilots to help them fly planes manually and recover from a high-altitude stall.

With the captain of Flight AF447 on a rest break, the report also expressed concern over “non-optimal task sharing” between the two co-pilots. Among the BEA’s 10 recommendations, it wants authorities to further define criteria for appointing a relief captain to ensure better synergy among relief crews.

When the captain of the Air France flight returned in the midst of the crisis, “neither of the two co-pilots gave a precise accounting of the problems encountered nor of actions undertaken, except that they had lost control of the plane and that they had tried everything,” the report said.

The captain had “implicitly” appointed the younger co-pilot as his relief before taking his regulation nap.

Experts caution against laying blame on the pilots _ all experienced and qualified to fly the aircraft.

“The information they’re getting from the brain of the airplane, the thing that they’ve been trained to trust, is sending them all off on tangents,” said John Goglia, a former U.S. National Transportation Safety Board member and an expert on airline safety.

“They’ve got bells and whistles going off, they’ve got a face full of lights,” Goglia said. And yet, “the pilots had an awful lot of information denied to them to help them deal with the situation” because of malfunctioning computers.

The crew had less than 4.5 minutes to act to correct an aircraft that was sounding alarms and giving sometimes false readings. However, BEA chief Jean-Paul Troadic said that, at the start at least, “the situation was salvageable.”

The chilling scenario as described by the voice and data recorders began at 2 hours, 10 minutes and 5 seconds into the overnight flight, when the autopilot and auto-thrust disengaged and a stall warning sounded twice in a row. The recordings end at 2 hours, 14 minutes and 28 seconds.

The co-pilot designated by the captain quickly took over manual controls of the aircraft, and nosed the plane upward _ the opposite of what was needed to give the plane lift.

A basic maneuver for stall recovery, which pilots are taught at the outset of their flight training, is to push the yoke forward and apply full throttle to lower the nose of the plane and build up speed. But he nosed up throughout much of the impending disaster and the plane reached a maximum height of 38,000 feet.

The report confirms that external speed sensors obstructed by ice crystals produced irregular speed readings on the plane. Since the accident, Air France has replaced the speed monitors on all its Airbus A330 and A340 aircraft.

The BEA’s report noted that Airbus warned pilots in 2008 that incorrect speed readings from the Pitot tubes could cause erroneous stall warnings. But Bouillard, the chief investigator, maintained that the pilots should “always respect a stall warning.”

Passengers, finishing dinner or napping, were never advised of the plane’s plight.

“From what we’ve been told, nobody realized what was going on. On that level, for my mental and moral comfort I am very pleased to hear this, when you know you had two people on board who were dear to you,” said Corinne Soulas, whose 24-year-old daughter Caroline and son-in-law were aboard the flight.

The alarms _ computer-generated voices screeching “stall … stall … stall” sounded numerous times, and once for a full 54 seconds.

Incomprehension and growing tension ensued.

At an alarm sound, the co-pilot not flying said at one point “What’s that about?” Curiously, the crew made no reference in cockpit exchanges to the warnings, the report said.

As described by the BEA report, several calls were made to the captain. The pilot not flying expressed concern several times at the captain’s absence, a concern that “probably raised the stress level of (that) pilot as he faces a situation he doesn’t understand.”

The flying pilot twice said he had lost control of the plane. Then, 27 seconds later the pilot not flying takes control but the designated pilot retakes control “almost immediately without any announcement.”

A minute and a half later, the captain arrived, but with no pertinent information from the co-pilots and a lack of information from the control panel he appears not fully aware of the situation _ and did not ask questions to better understand.

The report said that “multiple stops and reactivation (of the alarm) probably added to the confusion and disturbed his diagnosis of the situation.”

There has been a silent tug-of-war between Air France and Airbus, the plane’s constructor, over the crash.

Both were charged last March with involuntary homicide following the accident.

In a statement, Air France said there was currently no reason to question the crew’s technical skills. The airline said the report showed that a series of unlikely failures led to the stall and crash.

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A cheaper source of fuel, a dedicated sales team and workforce, and an investment in a tissue machine will help the last paper mill in New Hampshire’s North Country succeed, state and mill industry representatives say.

The changes come to the mill in Gorham as the papermaking industry fights growing competition from overseas plants in recent years. Some mills in northern New England have had staying power because they have developed business in specialized papers. Others have had to contend with rising oil costs to run the plants and a loss in demand as email and the Internet have replaced the need for some types of paper.

The Gorham mill, shut down for eight months but newly acquired by a New York private equity firm, is scheduled to reopen Wednesday with the startup of its paper towel machine and at least 70 of its approximately 240 workers called back. The plans are to add more staff and operations in July.

“They’re concentrating on areas that they can be strong on, that there’s a little bit less competition _ towel and tissue is a little bit more difficult to, let’s say, import from Asia and make it feasible,” said George Bald, commissioner of New Hampshire’s Department of Resources and Economic Development. “I just know that they are sharp people, they have been successful and they want to show that they can make this a very good success as well,” he said of Patriarch Partners, led by CEO Lynn Tilton.

Tilton, whose firm specializes in buying distressed manufacturing businesses and bringing them back to life, recently met with the mill workers and state and local officials who worked on finding a buyer after the last owner, Fraser Papers, declared bankruptcy in 2009.

“If I can show America a fairy tale of business owner and worker _ and government and business _ coming together to rebuild our country, then others will do it,” Tilton told the crowd. “It will take all of us to do it.”

Tilton plans to spend the money to convert the mill’s fuel source from oil to gas in about five months. “It’s a must,” she said. The gas line has been secured that would supply power to the mill from a landfill.

She said the largest investment will be a tissue machine, “so we can battle against foreign imports.” She estimated it would take about a year to build the machine and get it operating.

Tilton said one reason she took interest in Gorham was because Patriarch had bought the Old Town Fuel & Fiber mill in Maine a few years ago, the firm’s first mill venture.

Old Town’s owner had filed for bankruptcy. The mill had been selling pulp to customers such as the Gorham mill, but also was researching the development of biofuels.

“We got the mill back up and running, we put all the workers back to work, we were able to make money and we’re building a biorefinery,” Tilton said. “We’re going to be the first to make jet fuel out of wood on a mill level credit reports free. Everybody, every day is proud of the work we do together. So that is what gave me the inspiration to be here.”

Maine has about 10 paper mills and still is regarded as the No. 2 papermaking state by volume, behind Wisconsin, said John Williams, president of the Maine Pulp & Paper Association, a trade group. Some have succeeded in making coated papers for magazines and catalogs, and in tissue production. They have been able to hire more staff. Others, such as two Katahdin region paper mills that closed, struggled to find alternative fuel sources and cope with decreasing demand for certain products.

“The hope is someone will come in and buy those mills,” he said. Talks have been going on between the state and possible investors.

New Hampshire has seen a steady decline in paper mill jobs. Dennis Delay, an economist with the New Hampshire Center for Public Policy Studies, said New Hampshire had about 7,000 jobs in the paper industry until the mid-1970s, but then the decline started. “We were down to 4,000 jobs in paper by 2000, and dropped to 1,400 jobs in paper by 2009,” he said.

Northern New Hampshire, once populated by about a half-dozen paper mills, has seen them all close, the most recent being pulp and paper mills in Berlin and Groveton.

“Pulp is very, very competitive _ that again is coming from South America and Asia,” Bald said. The mills also were selling specialty papers, such as for financial reports, but the demand for that had lessened. “Unfortunately, those things a lot of people now get by email,” he said.

One mill that has had staying power in New Hampshire is Monadnock Paper Mills in Bennington. It’s been running since 1819.

Company CEO Richard Verney, whose family bought the business in 1948, talked about strategizing going as far back as the late 1960s and early 1970s: “We tried to find relatively small niche markets where we thought we could provide a product that had value and we keep at that. It’s a continual process of trying to find specialty markets as opposed to commodity markets.”

He said a lot of products have started out as specialties, such as disposable diapers, when many families were using cloth ones. Then as the volume grew, they became commodities. “You wouldn’t think of not using them,” he said.

Verney, whose mill employs about 150 workers and makes high-quality, uncoated printing papers and some coated papers for wallpaper and sandpaper backings, suggested that Gorham, too, would have to find markets for higher values than they presently manufacture for.

“You have to stay at it, and products that we’re making today a few years down the road, we won’t be making,” Verney said.

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U.S. companies squeezed more work out of their staffs in the first three months of the year. But the gain was much slower than in the previous three months, suggesting many employers will need to hire more workers if they want to produce more goods and services.

The Labor Department says productivity rose at an annual rate of 1.8 percent in the January-March period. That was slightly faster than an earlier estimate of 1.6 percent, but significantly lower than the 2.9 percent increase in the October-December period. Unit labor costs rose at a 0.7 percent rate, down from an initial estimate of 1 percent growth.

The revisions reflected more non-farm business output than previously believed while the drop in unit labor costs reflected lower compensation costs per hour of work.

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A bill to pump $360 million into a proposed Chinese air freight hub in St. Louis stalled on the legislative runway Friday. Now local business leaders are scratching for a way to keep the hub project from collapsing.

The clock expired on the so-called Aerotropolis tax credit package when the Missouri Legislature adjourned Friday evening, with House and Senate legislators stuck in an impasse over several economic development programs. Its supporters said the measure was essential to bringing Chinese cargo flights - and investment - to Lambert-St. Louis International Airport. Losing it will hurt.

But after three and a half years on the project, they weren’t quite ready to give up, even if they’re not yet sure of their next move.

“What happens next? I don’t know,” said Mike Jones, chairman of the Midwest China Hub Commission. “But I would hope we’re not Humpty Dumpty and the pieces can’t get put back together again.”

Several Aerotropolis backers took heart in the fact that their bill had strong support in both the House and Senate - it simply got caught up in prickly negotiations about Missouri’s Historic Tax Credit Program, negotiations that went on behind closed doors until the session’s closing minutes.

“If the House and Senate were miles and miles apart, that would be one thing. But they were really close at the end,” said Jeff Rainford, chief of staff to St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay. “We just ran out of time.”

Rainford and Jones were hopeful for a special session, where legislators might iron out their final differences. Gov. Jay Nixon, however, was cool to the idea Friday evening, saying he needed to see “consensus” before he would call for a return to the Capitol.

In recent weeks, Aerotropolis supporters have painted the bill as a must-do, especially if Lambert hopes to grow the effort from a few flights a week into a true hub. Chinese airline officials said as much in a March letter to Slay, after they heard details of the plan.

The incentive plans “are truly wise and innovative,” China Cargo executive vice president Gao Pei wrote, in a copy of the letter supplied to the Post-Dispatch. Without them, “opening a new air route to St. Louis will be very difficult, or even inconceivable.”

It is unclear how much of that stance is negotiation and how much is reality.

Negotiators for Lambert could get a better sense of that later this month, when China cargo executives are scheduled to visit St. Louis for another round of talks. The airport had hoped it could present them with a brand new incentive package. Now those odds look slim.

For some time, local leaders have been confident that they can land a few flights a week, even without the tax credits. But that wouldn’t provide the economic boost of a true hub, which, along with Aerotropolis-funded warehouse and manufacturing facilities, could by itself eventually generate more than 6,600 jobs, according to a recent study by the Regional Chamber and Growth Association.

The potential is there. Cargo experts say the Chinese want to dramatically increase the amount of U.S.-China air freight that flies on Chinese-owned planes, as opposed to U.S. or European carriers such as FedEx and DHL. Today, Chinese airlines control about 20 percent of the market. Their goal is a 50 percent share.

Routing much of that cargo through a single airport makes sense, experts say. Lambert - centrally located and underused - makes sense as a place to do it. It’s a great opportunity for St. Louis, said RCGA president Richard Fleming, but one that could easily pass the region by if nothing happens soon.

“Pretty soon we’re going to have to show an ability to do this deal or we’re going to lose the customer,” Fleming said. “It would really be a shame.”

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World powers clashed Wednesday over whether it is legal to supply weapons to Libya’s badly equipped rebels as Moammar Gadhafi’s troops beat back their advance on the ground.

Britain and the U.S. believe that existing U.N. Security Council resolutions on Libya could allow for foreign governments to arm the rebels.

But NATO, which is in the process of taking over command of air and other military operations in Libya, rejected that theory, saying an arms embargo was in place. China, Russia and Germany were also against supplying weapons to the rebels, with Moscow warning of possible al-Qaida links to some rebels.

Analysts, however, suggested the only hope of avoiding a lengthy stalemate in the conflict would be to provide anti-tank weapons and shoulder-launched missiles to the rebels, allowing them to take on Gadhafi’s military hardware.

British Prime Minister David Cameron said he supported U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s assessment that nations could legally supply weapons to Libyan rebels, despite an arms embargo being in place. Cameron told the House of Commons that U.N. Security Council resolutions “would not necessarily rule out the provision of assistance to those protecting civilians in certain circumstances.”

“We do not rule it out, but we have not taken any decision” on whether to supply weapons, he told lawmakers.

Obama said in television interviews Tuesday the U.S. also did not rule out providing arms to rebels, while Clinton said in London that such a move would be legally permitted _ read as a signal the policy is under consideration.

NATO insists the U.N. resolutions prohibit the supply of weapons into Libya, while Russia and China expressed concern that some allies were overstepping the mark. In Germany, Foreign Ministry spokesman Stefan Bredohl said the relevant resolutions included a “comprehensive arms embargo.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned Western nations against supplying weapons to Gadhafi’s opponents and said Moscow feared that some rebels could be allied with al-Qaida.

His remarks echoed concerns raised in Washington on Tuesday, when NATO’s top commander, U.S. Navy Adm. James Stavridis, said officials had seen “flickers” of possible al-Qaida and Hezbollah involvement with the dissident forces.

The comments were seized upon by Michele Bachmann, the tea party-backed conservative congresswoman, who said the U.S. should rule out supplying weapons because of those concerns about an al-Qaida influence.

NATO said agreement from all 28 members of the alliance would be needed to participate in the arming of rebel forces, and that approving such a move would risk further rifts between the members themselves and outside partners such as the Arab League and African Union no fax cash loans.

“The U.N. resolution forbids arms to enter Libya,” said an official who could not be named under standing regulations. “Quite honestly, NATO wouldn’t even consider doing anything else unless a new U.N. Security Council resolution is issued to that effect.”

In London, ex-British foreign secretary Malcolm Rifkind urged nations to ensure Libya’s rebels are “properly assisted to enable this war to be brought to an end as soon as possible.”

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said he supported that view, but also acknowledged that “introducing new weapons into a conflict can have unforeseeable and unknown consequences.”

Retired Brigadier Benjamin Barry, of London’s International Institute for Strategic Studies, said it wasn’t certain rebels would have the ability to use any weapons supplied by the West, because they would likely require basic training.

“The kind of arms that could be provided are simple, easy to use anti-armor weapons, unguided shoulder-launched rockets, guided missiles and mortars,” Barry said.

But he acknowledged there would be “a risk that these weapons could pass into unfriendly hands after the fighting is over.”

The history of arming anti-Soviet rebels in Afghanistan would weigh heavily on any decision to offer military hardware, Hague said. “There are examples of weapons being given to people in good faith and then those weapons being used for other purposes,” he told lawmakers.

Hague confirmed Britain had ordered the expulsion of five Libyan diplomats _ including the country’s military attache _ over threats to opponents of Gadhafi’s regime in the U.K., and because they posed a potential security risk.

“Were these individuals to remain in Britain, they could pose a threat to our security,” Hague said. Officials explained the Libyan diplomats had been involved in attempts to harass opposition supporters in Britain.

Hague said British diplomats had held talks in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi with opposition figures in recent days _ before similar meetings being held by U.S. and French officials _ to seek assurances about their motives.

He said he was assured that, despite the warning from Stavridis, violent Islamists did not hold a prominent role within Libya’s rebel movement.

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The agencies that measure employment trends here and elsewhere delivered a mixed message Friday on the St. Louis job situation.

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, regional unemployment in January stood at 9.6 percent

Congress will probably approve a measure this week to keep the U.S. government in operation through April 8, Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the majority whip, said yesterday.

The legislation, proposed by House Republicans March 11, would reduce discretionary spending by about $6 billion and fund the U.S. government for three weeks, replacing a measure that expires March 18. Democrat Durbin, speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union,” said the Senate would take up the measure once it passes the House, where Republicans have majority control.

Enacting the sixth stopgap spending measure of fiscal 2011 is needed to prevent a government shutdown and will provide lawmakers and President Barack Obama with more time to work out a deal to fund U.S. programs through the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30, Durbin said. Congress needs to advance the measure to facilitate an agreement addressing the nation’s long-term fiscal straits, Durbin said.

“We’re not going to balance America’s budget in the next six months,” Durbin said. Republican lawmakers, led by the House, propose cutting $61 billion in government spending this year, which Durbin rejected as part of this year’s budget. “That goes way too far,” he said. The Democratic-controlled Senate rejected that proposal March 9.

Fiscal Issues

Long-term fiscal issues can’t be resolved in stopgap funding bills, Durbin said. “We’re looking at this in honest and hard terms about how we deal with this deficit, not in a matter of six months but over a period of time so that we responsibly cut spending and don’t do it at the expense of America’s economic growth.”

The three-week measure worked out between the White House and lawmakers from both parties would forestall a shutdown of non-essential government services after March 18.

Senator Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican and the minority leader, said on “Fox News Sunday” yesterday that the short-term bill puts the U.S. on a “slow path” toward the $61 billion target.

While Senate Republicans will support the latest spending bill, they will insist on deeper budget cuts as a condition of funding the government through Sept. 30 and of voting to raise the debt ceiling, McConnell said.

“My prediction is not a single one of the 47 Republicans will vote to raise the debt ceiling unless it includes with it some credible effort to do something about our debt,” McConnell said.

Political Bickering

President Barack Obama on March 11 urged lawmakers to work out a deal that keeps the government running through the end of the fiscal year, saying the public expects them to “stop with the political bickering.”

“We can’t keep on running the government on two-week extensions,” Obama said. “That’s irresponsible.”

Representative Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican who is the majority whip, vowed a government shutdown wouldn’t happen and said Obama and Senate Democrats hold the keys to an agreement on financing government operations through the end of the fiscal year.

“We think that Democrats need to step up and actually produce something,” McCarthy said on “State of the Union.”

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House Republicans continued their drive Wednesday to slash $60 billion from the current year’s budget, with some of the deepest cuts targeted at education and environmental regulation.

First up was a controversial amendment to cut to strip $450 million slated to build a new engine for the F-35 fighter jet, which passed 233-198, with bipartisan support.

That cut, in particular, demonstrates the strong sentiment in both parties to crack down on spending that appears excessive, transcending political priority lists. GOP leaders, including Speaker John Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, wanted to keep that engine funded; opponents included Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

Other deep cuts aim to slash funding for early childhood development programs that help low-income children, special education programs at public schools and family planning programs.

House Republicans have vowed to cull $60 billion from the fiscal 2011 budget.

A day after House Speaker John Boehner acknowledged that cuts could cost some federal jobs, adding, "so be it. We’re broke," Democrats wasted no time accusing Republicans of killing jobs and hurting the economy.

They’re citing a report by the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, which gets funding from labor unions, that $60 billion in cuts would result in hundreds of thousands of jobs lost in both the public and private sectors.

"These cuts recklessly damage programs," said House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer. "We are talking about cutting tomorrow’s jobs."

Although the 2011 budget up for debate only covers the next seven months, March through September, the clock is ticking to pass something soon. The current stop-gap measure that’s keeping the lights on at federal agencies expires March 4.

The pressure is on Republican lawmakers to outdo each other when it comes to cutting the budget. The GOP took control of the House after last fall’s election riding a wave of public discontent of the mounting deficit and government spending.

They’ve also pledged to allow any lawmaker to offer any suggestion for cuts. There are nearly 600 amendments on the table. However not all will be taken up, since many are duplicative and others that will get blocked, like a Democratic proposal to restore $150 million for safety on the DC Metro system, which made headlines in 2009 when a collision killed nine people.

Cuts to be discussed target many White House priorities, such as Treasury’s mortgage modification program for homeowners, as well as the Environmental Protection Agency’s efforts to cut greenhouse gases.

If lawmakers fail to pass a budget, or at least another stop-gap measure, by March 4, the federal government could be shut down like it was during the GOP showdown with the Clinton administration in 1995.

The House was expected to pass the budget by Thursday, but the timing is uncertain as the process has gone longer than expected. The Senate isn’t expected to take up the measure for a few more weeks. Then the chambers will likely have to negotiate the differences and come to a compromise.

The White House has vowed to veto the budget if the deep cuts that House Republican want survive, saying the president can’t support a bill that "undermines critical priorities or national security." 

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Labor unrest unleashed by Hosni Mubarak’s ouster flared again Wednesday in Egypt despite a warning by the ruling military that protests and strikes were hampering efforts to improve the economy and return life to normal.

Hundreds of Cairo airport employees protested inside the arrivals terminal at Cairo International Airport to press demands for better wages and health coverage. Their protest did not disrupt flights.

In the industrial Nile Delta city of Mahallah al-Koubra, workers from Egypt’s largest textile factory went on strike over pay and calls for an investigation into alleged corruption at the factory, according to labor rights activist Mustafa Bassiouni.

Mahallah in April 2008 witnessed the country’s largest protests in decades, when demonstrators seeking better pay and a check on rising food prices. The youth movement behind the Mahallah protest then was a key player in the 18 days of anti-Mubarak protests that broke out Jan.. 25 and eventually forced the longtime authoritarian leader to step down.

In Port Said, a coastal city at the northern tip of the Suez canal, about 1,000 people demonstrated to demand that a chemical factory be closed because it was dumping waste in a lake near the city guaranteed fast personal loans.

Authorities, meanwhile, decided to put back by another week the reopening of schools and universities across the country, an indication that the country still has some way to go before it returns to full normalcy. Schools and universities were just starting their midyear break when the protests broke out.

Banks remained closed Wednesday and would remain shut Thursday, the last day of the business week in Egypt. There was no word on whether they would reopen Sunday, the start of the business week.

The stock market has been closed for the past three weeks and, again, there was no word on when it would resume operating. The market lost nearly 17 percent of its value in two tumultuous sessions in late January before it was ordered shut to halt the slide.

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