***Delegates and lobbyists gathering in Egypt for a UN conference on globaf population growth need look no further than the host city for a vivid example of what can happen when people multiply faster than governments can cope. Overcrowding is so chronic that tens of thousands of Cairenes live in cemeteries: there is no room for the dead, let alone the living.

ASMAA Ramdan shares her kitchen with a long-dead sheikh. Her living room doubles as a resting place for two recently departed lawyers, and her backyard contains a motley collection of anonymous corpses.

The mother of six is one of thousands of Cairo residents who live In sprawling cemeter les on the edge of the Egyptian capital. "Mind how you go. they buried a woman there four days ago. says Asmaa. pegging up her washing over a heap of fading flowers.

It is an amicable arrangement. Asmaa needed a home. The two-room 19th century tomb with underground burial vaults was vacant and the family moved in more than 50 years ago. In exchange for free accommodation. Asmaa and her husband bum incense over the sheikh every Thursday and sweep out the living room when the lawyers' nearest and dearest come to call.

Over the years. Cairo's so-called Cities of the Dead have been adapted to the needs of the living. Today's residents live in what were intended as rooms to accommodate relatives visiting their dead. Tombs have been converted into shops, cafes, workshops and even schools. Running water and electricity have been installed, and the cemeterydwellers have outfitted their unorthodox homes with all the modern conveniences from video recorders to washing machines.

The graveyards were originally established more than 1,000 years ago outside the perimeters of the old city and reserved more or less exclusively for the dead. But as time went by and the city grew, the tombs and houses crept closer together until eventually the two overlapped.

The area is roughly divided into two parts known as the Northern and Southern Cemeteries. About 90 per cent of the tombs date from the last century, but evidence of earlier generations is still apparent, most notably in the 15th century mausoleum of the Mameluke sultans.

In a city of more than 15 million people, the graveyard's inhabitants have it relatively good. While the majority of Cairo residents live’ In cramped and often squalid conditions tn hastily built high-rise blocks, the mausoleums are airy and solid, convenient to the city centre and free of traffic fumes.

But around the city, ceme tery residents — both living and dead — face eviction, as Cairo officials try to cut down on the area's notorious crime problem, find alternate burial grounds and take advantage of the necropolis' potential for property development.

The vast cemeteries with their maze-like, nameless alleys. offer an ideal hideaway for members of the Cairo under world. Illegal activities perpe trated among the tombs range from the heinous to the downright .bizarre. Weapons manufacturing, drugs factoriesand prostitution rings are commonplace, explains a policeman responsible for one of the cemeteries most notorious areas

Drug dealers who scraps away the inside of children's skulls to produce an almost perfect cocaine look-alike. ’ single mothers who abandon their newborn babies among the tombs, and rapists are

among those who seek out the necropolis' anonymity.

"The cemeteries Sre Ideal for criminals because It is very difficult for the police to find' out where they are or what they are doing." says the off! cer. As soon as we get a tip-off. we go out there, but the place is full of eyes and by the time the police arrive the criminals are usually long

gone."

This is one reason why the city authorities are anxious to see the ancient burial grounds razed. Another reason is that the cemeteries have long since ceased to meet the requirements of the city. As early as 1933 the cemeteries were declared full by royal decree but nothing was done to stop fresh burials. Now the problem is even worse. Although the burial vaults are communal (as one corpse decays, another takes its place), there is simply not enough room for so many dead, last year, more than 54.000 people died in Cairo, forcing the creation of new cemeteries on desert sites which make huge, remote and expandable burial grounds.

A more cynical reason for the urgent removal of the necropolis is that it is sitting on more than 2.400 acres of inner-city land ripe for development.

The planning of the city in general necessitates removing all Informal areas inside the city. Including these cemetery sites," says Cairo Governor Omar Abdel Akher. "The area could be exploited as a new lung for Cairo and be developed with small villas with their own gardens, as well as clubs and youth centres."

The idea sounds ambitious given the logistical nightmare of relocating the tens of thousands of people who live in the graveyards, as well as exhuming generations of Cairo’s dead. Undeterred, however, the city officials, with the help of a 50 million franc grant from the French government, has already made detailed plans to relocate and redesign the Baab el Nasr section of the Northern Cemetery.

The plans recommend that the cemetery and its 2.000 tombs should’ be bulldozed and turned Into a landscaped park with a few strategic mausoleums preserved as tourist attractions. That is only the beginning. The Greater Cairo Master Scheme 2000 proposes that all the large inner-city cemeteries could be moved to alternative sites outside Cairo.

"We are ready to start work but we can’t go ahead because the owners of the tombs have complained to ithe Prime Minister about the removal of the dead." Akher says. "We have to convince them that there is nothing wrong ^ith moving the deceased before we can continue."

Rumours of the move have already prompted families whose ancestors are buried in the city graveyards to buy plots In the new desert cemeteries, where they can be confident that their dearly departed can rest in peace without the threat of reinternment and without having to put up with the clank of pots and pans overhead.

But life in the cemeteries carries on regardless of the winds of change. Mohamed Sayed el Medanl. a caretaker In Cairo's Northern Cemetery, sits drinking tea among the graves. Mohamed's home, in which he raised his seven children. Is the tomb of a minor aristocrat with an additional storey tacked on for extra legroom.

Despite the offer of alternative accommodation. Mohamed has no plans to move. "I don’t have any problems with the dead, he savs. They are nice and quiet. — GEMINI NEWS

HELEN MILES ts a freelance journalist in Cairo.