Three shot dead in Cairo, Islamist protests spread <http://www.reuters.com/> Description: ReutersBy Tom Perry and Alexander Dziadosz | Reuters 7 minutes ago
By Tom Perry and Alexander Dziadosz
CAIRO (Reuters) - At least three protesters were shot dead on Friday outside
the Republican Guard barracks in Cairo where deposed President Mohamed Mursi
is being held, security sources said, as angry Islamist supporters
confronted troops across Egypt.
As darkness fell, thousands of pro- and anti-Mursi demonstrators gathered in
parts of Cairo. Soldiers and special forces backed by armored personnel
carriers attempted to keep small groups from the two factions apart.
Tens of thousands of people marched across the country in what Mursi's
Muslim Brotherhood movement called a "Friday of Rage" to protest against his
ouster and an interim government set up to prepare for new elections.
Egypt's first freely elected president was toppled on Wednesday in what his
supporters call a military coup, the latest twist in a tumultuous two years
since the fall of Hosni Mubarak in "Arab Spring" uprisings that swept the
region in 2011.
Mursi supporters in Cairo were hit by shotgun pellets after a crowd of
several hundred people marched towards the barracks where Mursi is being
held. Reuters photographers saw at least one dead young man and several
severely wounded being carried from the scene.
The army denied blame for the shootings. An army spokesman said troops did
not open fire on the demonstrators and soldiers used blank rounds and
teargas to control the crowd. It was unclear whether security forces units
other than army troops were also present.
Later, tens of thousands of cheering Islamists gathered near a mosque in a
Cairo suburb where they were addressed by Brotherhood leader Mohamed Badie,
free to address them despite reports on Thursday that he had been arrested.
In a fiery speech, he vowed to "complete the revolution", and repeatedly
referred to Mursi as the president.
"There cannot be a concession on our President Mohamed Mursi, otherwise it
is our lives," he shouted as a military helicopter hovered low overhead.
"To the great Egyptian army, we are the ones who protect your back, and you
protect us from our enemies. Your bullets are not fired on the sons of your
nation, you are more honorable than that."
ALARM IN WASHINGTON
Continued violence will alarm the United States. Washington has so far
avoided referring to the army's removal of Mursi as a "coup", a word that
under U.S. law would require a halt to its $1.5 billion in annual aid.
The top U.S. military officer, General Martin Dempsey, spoke to the chief of
staff of Egypt's armed forces on Friday, although no details were provided.
Mursi's opponents also say it was not a coup but an intervention to impose
the "people's will".
The African Union voted to suspend Egypt from all its activities in reaction
to Mursi's overthrow "until the restoration of constitutional order."
Several dozen people have been killed in the last month of unrest, during
which huge rallies in Cairo and other cities called for Mursi's resignation
amid anger over economic stagnation and perceptions of a Brotherhood power
grab.
His overthrow on Wednesday was greeted with wild scenes of celebration
involving millions of people, but infuriated his supporters who fear a
return to the suppression of Islamists they endured under generations of
military rule.
Mohamed Ezzat, 35, who said he was a Brotherhood member, said protesters
would stage a sit-in outside the Republican Guard headquarters and other
locations throughout Cairo, to protest the "coup" against Mursi.
"The most important thing with the army is that they stay out of politics.
We had a legitimate, elected president, and the army came and removed him,"
he said.
Hundreds of Islamists marched to the national broadcasting center on the
banks of the Nile in central Cairo, bringing them close to Tahrir Square
where a crowd of thousands of anti-Mursi demonstrators had gathered.
The army has said it intends to keep the rival factions apart, and soldiers
and armored personnel carriers were deployed in the area, apparently for
that purpose.
UNREST SPREADS
Clashes were repeated across the country.
Thousands of Islamists took to the streets of Alexandria and Assiut to join
protests, and in Damanhour, capital of the Beheira province in the Nile
Delta, 21 people were wounded in violence between supporters and opponents
of Mursi.
Ehab el-Ghoneimy, manager of the Damanhour general hospital, said three
people had been wounded with live bullets, others were wounded with
birdshot, rocks or had been hit with rods.
In the Suez city of Ismailia, soldiers fired into the air as Mursi
supporters tried to break into the governor's office. The Islamists
retreated and there were no casualties, security sources said.
State television and radio also reported clashes in the Nile Delta towns of
Gharbeya and Beheira, in Qena south of Cairo and the rural province of
Fayoum.
In the Sinai Peninsula bordering Israel, two police officers were shot dead
on Friday by unknown gunmen in El Arish, medical sources said. It was not
clear if the attack was linked to the protests.
Overnight, gunmen fired rocket-propelled grenades at army checkpoints
guarding an airport there and rocketed a police station near the border with
the Palestinian territory of Gaza, killing one soldier and wounding two.
An army spokesman said the army in the Sinai Peninsula was "on alert". He
denied an earlier report by state-owned media Al-Ahram that a state of
emergency had been imposed in the South Sinai and Suez provinces, which had
caused a spike in oil prices from international markets on edge over the
unrest.
Egypt's interim head of state, Adli Mansour, appointed on Thursday, began
work to prepare the country for new elections, dissolving parliament by
decree. State television also said he appointed Mohamed Ahmed Farid as head
of intelligence.
Foreign diplomacy was being handled by the head of Egypt's armed forces on
Friday, as General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who announced Mursi's overthrow on
Wednesday, called Saudi King Abdullah to reassure him Egypt was stable.
(Reporting by Asma Alsharif, Mike Collett-White, Alexander Dziadosz, Seham
El-Oraby, Shaimaa Fayed, Maggie Fick, Alastair Macdonald, Shadia Nasralla,
Tom Perry, Yasmine Saleh, Paul Taylor, and Patrick Werr in Cairo,
Abdelrahman Youssef in Alexandria and Yursi Mohamed in Ismailia; Writing by
Mike Collett-White; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
Thé Mulindwas Communication Group
"With Yoweri Museveni and Dr. Kiiza Besigye Uganda is in anarchy"
Kuungana Mulindwa Mawasiliano Kikundi
"Pamoja na Yoweri Museveni na Dk. Kiiza Besigye Uganda ni katika machafuko"
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