The uprising in Egypt against President Hosni Mubarak has many hoping the country will become more free and open as a result, but for some foreigners, including Americans, a lack of commercial flights out of the country is causing concern (via USAToday). Among those stranded in Egypt are four University of Colorado students studying abroad at an institution on the outskirts of Cairo, where protests have also erupted, writes Boulder’s Daily Camera.

Haytham Bahoora, an assistant professor of Arabic studies at CU, once lived and studied in Cairo and says students will be safe as long as they stay away from the protests and crowds. In the past, the only serious opposition to Mubarak has been the Muslim Brotherhood, but Bahoora points out that this time the uprising is a broad-based movement against an “almost three-decade-long rule of a corrupt and authoritarian regime.” That was the message a group of Egyptian immigrants and supporters took to the state Capitol in Denver on Sunday in a show of solidarity with those in their home country. Hossam Hassan, who was born in Egypt, told 9News, “We need Hosni Mubarak to step down.”