At least five people have been killed and more than 200 injured in Egypt during clashes between opponents and supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi. In the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, the fierce clashes between rival protesters erupted after Friday prayers over this month’s ouster of Morsi in a military coup. The pro-Morsi protesters were marching through the city’s streets when their opponents attacked them with guns, knives, and rocks, an eyewitness said. Five people were killed and at least 50 injured in the Alexandria violence. According to the Health Ministry, more than 200 people were injured in scattered confrontations nationwide on Friday as hundreds of thousands of people held demonstrations across the country for and against the army’s coup against Morsi, the country’s first democratically elected president. Tens of thousands of Egyptians heeded a call by army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to hold rallies in favor of the coup, while tens of thousands of Muslim Brotherhood activists and their supporters took to the streets to demand Morsi’s reinstatement. On July 3, Sisi announced that Morsi, a former leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood, was no longer in office and declared that the head of the Supreme Constitutional Court, Adly Mahmoud Mansour, had been appointed as the new interim president of Egypt. The army also suspended the constitution. Army officials said Morsi, who took office in June 2012, was being held “preventively” by the military. On July 5, Muslim Brotherhood supreme leader Mohammed Badie said the coup against Morsi was illegal and millions would remain on the street until he is reinstated as president. Badie vowed to “complete the revolution” that toppled the Western-backed regime of former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak in 2011. The Egyptians launched a revolution against the pro-Israeli regime on January 25, 2011, which eventually brought an end to the 30-year dictatorship of Mubarak on February 11, 2011. Earlier on Friday, Egyptian state media reported that Morsi is being detained while prosecutors investigate claims that he conspired with the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas to carry out attacks during the revolution. The Muslim Brotherhood said in a statement issued later in the day that the charges against Morsi showed the “complete bankruptcy of the leaders of the bloody coup.” Egyptians “reject the return of the dictatorial police state and all the repression, tyranny and theft it entails,” Muslim Brotherhood spokesman Ahmed Aref said in the statement.
Jul272013