Mubarak Appears on TV, Defends Security Forces

CAIRO — Embattled President Hosni Mubarak has asked his cabinet to resign, he said during a TV address to the nation.

Appearing on TV for the first time since protests erupted demanding his ouster, he said he would press ahead with social, economic and political reforms.

He is defending security forces' crackdown on protesters.

Protesters have seized the streets of Cairo, battling police with stones and firebombs, burning down the ruling party headquarters, and defying a night curfew enforced by a military deployment. It is the peak of unrest posing the most dire threat to Mubarak in his three decades of authoritarian rule.