As lockdown clears the air, Cairo looks to keep pollution low

The minarets of Sultan Hassan Mosque and the Al-Rifa'i Mosque are seen as a traffic jam forms during a sandstorm in Cairo, Egypt, on January 6, 2019. [Reuters]

 It is a Thursday evening in downtown Cairo, usually a crowded and noisy time as the weekend gets underway. But today the streets are quiet, and the air is noticeably clean.

"It has been a long time since I breathed such fresh air here and saw the sky clean like that," observed Fathi Ibrahim, a 52-year-old resident of downtown Cairo.