235 dead as police storm pro-Morsi encampments
Print Edition
At least 235 people were killed yesterday when riot police swept in with armored vehicles, bulldozers and helicopters to clear two sprawling encampments of supporters of Egypt’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi, sparking running street battles elsewhere in Cairo and other cities.
The interim government declared a monthlong state of emergency, ordering the armed forces to support the police in efforts to restore law and order and protect state facilities. A nighttime curfew for Cairo and 10 provinces was put into effect.
A cameraman for British broadcaster Sky News and a Dubai-based newspaper reporter were killed during yesterday’s violence, their employers said.
Sky said Mick Deane, 61, was shot and wounded while covering the breakup of the protest camps. It said he was treated for his injuries but died soon after.
The Gulf News, a state-backed newspaper in the United Arab Emirates, said journalist Habiba Ahmed Abd Elaziz, 26, was shot dead near the Rabaah al-Adawiya mosque in Cairo as security forces moved in.
Clashes also broke out elsewhere in the capital and other provinces across Egypt, injuring more than 2,000 people nationwide, as Islamist anger spread over the crackdown on the six-week-old sit-ins of Morsi supporters. Police stations, government buildings and Coptic Christian churches were attacked or set ablaze. Smoke clogged the sky above Cairo and fires smoldered on the streets.
The smaller camp was cleared relatively quickly, but clashes continued at the main site near the mosque that has served as the epicenter of the pro-Morsi campaign.
The assault came after days of warnings by the military-backed interim administration that replaced Morsi after he was ousted in a July 3 coup.
UN condemnation
The two sit-in camps at two major intersections on opposite sides of the Egyptian capital began in late June to show support for Morsi. Protesters, many from Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood, have demanded his reinstatement.
Yesterday’s violence drew condemnation from other predominantly Muslim countries, and from the UN and the United States, which said the crackdown will only make it more difficult for Egypt to move forward.
A statement from the Brotherhood’s media office in London said: “The world cannot sit back and watch while innocent men, women and children are being indiscriminately slaughtered. The world must stand up to the military junta’s crime before it is too late.”
The smaller of the two camps was cleared of protesters by late morning, with most of them taking refuge in the nearby Orman botanical gardens on the campus of Cairo University and the zoo.
Security forces later stormed the larger camp in the Cairo district of Nasr and were closing in on the mosque. Several wanted Brotherhood leaders were believed to be hiding there.
The pro-Morsi Anti-Coup alliance claimed that security forces used live ammunition, but the Interior Ministry, which is in charge of the police, said its forces only used tear gas and that they came under fire from the camp.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s political arm claimed that more than 500 protesters were killed and some 9,000 wounded in the two camps, but those figures could not be confirmed.
Vice President Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and pro-reform leader in the interim government, resigned in protest over the crackdown.
He said he was not prepared to be held responsible for a “single drop of blood,” and that only more violence will result, according to a letter sent to Interim President Adly Mansour.
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