UPDATE 1-Egypt's Islamists demand Mubarak govt goes

UPDATE 1-Egypt's Islamists demand Mubarak govt goes
(Updates with Erian comment)

CAIRO Feb 3 (Reuters) - The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's biggest
organised opposition group, said on Thursday that President Hosni
Mubarak and his government had to go to avoid a crackdown on protesters
if it was allowed stay in power.

Senior Brotherhood leader Essam el-Erian told Reuters the movement was calling for the removal of "the regime, not the state".

"This regime's legitimacy is finished, with its president, with his
deputy, its ministers, its party, its parliament. We said this clearly.
We refuse to negotiate with it because it has lost its legitimacy," he
said.

Erian walked out of jail last week as law and order collapsed in the
days after mass anti-Mubarak protests began and police were temporarily
withdrawn from the streets.

Earlier, Al Jazeera quoted a Brotherhood statement saying: "We demand
that this regime is overthrown and we demand the formation of a national
unity government for all the factions."

"Even if this regime stays for hours, its main concern will be to take
revenge on all its opponents," the statement said. (Reporting by Samia
Nakhoul and Tom Perry; Editing by Matthew Jones)