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He was once a powerful symbol of autocracy in the Arab world, but Wednesday, a frail Hosni Mubarak was wheeled into a Cairo courtroom cage to face trial for allegedly ordering the killing of anti-government protesters.

Dressed in a white prison uniform, Mubarak, 83, was placed in a mesh and iron cage, a standard procedure in Egyptian criminal trials. The former leader, who also faces charges of corruption, peered between the bars, identified himself and denied any culpability.

"All the things that have been said are not true," he said.

It was a jaw-dropping moment, leaving many incredulous at the sight of the former dictator stripped of his power, the first of the targets of this year's Arab Spring to face justice. If convicted, Mubarak could be punished with death.

Arab media described it as the "trial of the century." People all over the region were glued to televisions and radios for news of the proceedings.

It garnered an array of reactions from the Egyptian people as other embattled leaders in the region -- among them Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, Syria's Bashar al-Assad and Yemen's Ali Abdullah Saleh -- watched closely the fate of one of their own. Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, deposed before Mubarak in January, fled to Saudi Arabia and was tried in absentia.

"Every dictator in the region is watching this in total fear, thinking he could be next," said Egyptian journalist Mona Eltahawy. "And all the citizens in the region, ordinary people in the Arab or Middle East or North Africa, are thinking 'we wish we could put our tyrants on trial.'"

Mubarak, his much despised interior minister, Habib El Adly, and six of the latter's assistants face trial on the same charges. Also facing charges are Mubarak's sons, Gamal and Alaa.

Mubarak will return to court August 15, when his trial resumes. Legal proceedings will continue Friday when El Adly appears before the judge.

Seeing the once Pharoah-like Mubarak reduced to a crippled man in a cage could garner some sympathy for him, said Barak Barfi, a researcher with the New America Foundation. More at http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/meast/08/03/egypt.mubarak.trial/index.ht
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