Seven men were arrested in Cairo on Monday in connection with the rape of at least five women in Tahrir Square during the inauguration of the country's new president, reports state.

On Sunday, thousands of Egyptians gathered in Tahrir Square to celebrate the inauguration of the nation's seventh president, Abdelfatah El Sisi.

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While the gathering seemed cheerful from afar, a closer look documented a much grimmer reality.

Using a cellphone, an unidentified man filmed a sexual assault being carried out as revelers celebrated Egypt's new leadership. The graphic video was later posted to YouTube and had 48,000 viewers within hours.

A second video also went viral, this time of a correspondent for Tahrir Channel who is shown reporting live from Tahrir Square. During her report, the reporter brings up the high number of sexual assault attacks taking place to which her male news anchor replies nonchalantly that "boys will be boys."

The video sparked outrage worldwide and once again brought a global focus in on the issue of rape in Egypt - a nation considered to be experiencing an epidemic of sexual assault.

The country has reportedly taken steps towards addressing the issues and the Ministry of Interior responded immediately to the reports of sexual assault on Sunday, arresting seven men between the ages of 15 and 49 and accusing them of assaulting four women and injuring a police officer.

Before stepping down last week, Interim President Adly Mansour also put in place a law which criminalizes sexual assault regardless of the medium in which it occurs.

Violators of the law face harsher punishments and can be forced to spend at least a year in prison and pay fines between EGP 10,000 and EGP 20,000.

A wave of sexual harassment carried out against women at universities across the country in recent months show that Egypt still has a long way to go before its female citizens can feel safe.

The dominating male culture in the nations seems to be a driving force behind lack of progress as Egyptian presenter Tamer Amin famously declared on' Egypt Today that women attend university not to study but to draw male attention, and several other TV presenters have since blamed women for provoking their aggressors through the way they dress. 

TagsEgypt, Tahrir square, Assault, Rape, women