Hundreds killed in Egypt clashes; Curfew in Cairo; 43 cops dead

Security forces Wednesday stormed two huge Cairo protest camps occupied for weeks by supporters of Egypt's ousted president Mohamed Morsi, leaving over 250 people dead in a crackdown that turned into a bloodbath, the Egyptian health ministry said.

It said another 1,403 people were injured as violence roiled several provinces.

Egyptian vice president Mohamed ElBaradei announced his resignation in a letter to the interim president on Wednesday.

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Egypt's interior minister says 43 policemen were killed in clashes with Morsi supporters.

Egyptian security forces will not allow any more sit-ins anywhere in the country, Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim said on Wednesday, after the police broke up two Cairo protest camps set up by supporters of deposed President Mohamed Mursi.

"We will not allow any other sit-in in any square in any place in the country," Ibrahim said in a televised news conference.

Hundreds of supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi were given safe passage out of a Cairo protest camp stormed by Egyptian security forces in a bloody crackdown earlier in the day.

Television footage showed Morsi supporters leaving the Rabaa al-Adawiya encampment through a security corridor, some flashing victory signs.

A security official confirmed to AFP that hundreds of people were taking advantage of the safe passage offer but said some diehards stayed behind amid renewed clashes with security forces.

"It has become too difficult to continue bearing responsibility for decisions I do not agree with and whose consequences I fear," ElBaradei said.

He said his conscience was troubled over the loss of life "particularly as I believe it could have been avoided".

"Unfortunately those who gain from what happened today are those who call for violence and terror, the extremist groups," he said.

The government imposed a state of emergency, starting at 1400 GMT on Wednesday, which was to last a month.

The government on Wednesday declared a curfew in Cairo and 10 other provinces in a bid to contain nationwide violence.The curfew was to begin at 7:00 pm (1700 GMT), before sunset, and run until 6:00 am (0400 GMT), a government spokesman said in a statement read out on state television.

It applies to the provinces of Cairo, Giza, Alexandria, Beni Sueif, Menya, Assiut, Sohag, Beheira, North Sinai, South Sinai and Suez.

As clashes raged in the capital, three churches were attacked in central Egypt, with Christian activists accusing Morsi loyalists of waging "a war of retaliation against Copts in Egypt".

Hours after the first tear gas canisters rained down on tents of protesters in the sprawling Rabaa Al Adawiya camp in east Cairo, an AFP correspondent counted at least 124 bodies in makeshift morgues.

In a field hospital, its floors slippery with blood, doctors struggled to cope with the casualties, leaving the hopeless cases, even if still alive.

The Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsi emerged, said that 2,200 people had been killed and over 10,000 injured as authorities confirmed 56 deaths in Wednesday's violence.

Security officials had spoken of a gradual dispersal of the sit-ins over several days but the dramatic descent on the squares shortly after dawn came as a surprise to many.

Al Azhar, Sunni Islam's main seat of learning, which sided with the military in its overthrow of Morsi on July 3, distanced itself from the crackdown.

"Al-Azhar stresses to all Egyptians that it did not know about the methods used for the dispersal of the protests except through media channels," Grand Imam Ahmed Al Tayyeb said in a televised statement.

Witnesses and an AFP correspondent said after firing tear gas security forces surged into Rabaa Al Adawiya, sparking pandemonium among the thousands of protesters who had set up the camp soon after Morsi was ousted.

Men in gas masks rushed to grab each canister and dunk them in containers of water, as the main stage near the mosque of the camp blared Islamic anthems and protesters chanted "Allahu Akbar" (God is greatest.)

Clashes quickly erupted between protesters and security forces on the outskirts of the camp, with automatic fire reverberating across the square.

Protest leaders wearing gas masks stood defiantly on a stage while crowds of people wearing face masks stood amid the swirling tear gas as bulldozers began dismantling the camp.

In the smaller of the protest camps at Al-Nahda square in central Cairo, police said they took control of the square after two hours.

Television footage showed flattened tents, as women and children flanked by police and army troops were led out of the square.

Dozens rounded up in the dispersal were shown sitting on the ground, handcuffed and surrounded by security forces.

The violence came amid international appeals for calm.

Berlin called on all sides to renounce violence and return to negotiations and Britain, Iran and Qatar condemned the use of force by Egyptian police.

It was a dramatic turn of events for the Muslim Brotherhood, who just over a year ago celebrated Morsi's win as Egypt's first elected president.

But his turbulent year in power, marred by political turmoil, deadly clashes and a crippling economic crisis, turned many against the Islamist movement.

On June 30, millions took to the streets to call on the army to remove Morsi.

Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood urged Egyptians to take to the streets in their thousands to denounce the "massacre".

"This is not an attempt to disperse, but a bloody attempt to crush all voices of opposition to the military coup," Brotherhood spokesman Gehad Al Haddad said on Twitter.

The Rabaa Al Adawiya protest camp, where several Brotherhood leaders had been staying, "is calling on Egyptians to take to the streets to stop the massacre," Haddad said.

But the anger against the Islamist movement was evident Wednesday as residents of several neighbourhoods clashed with Morsi loyalists.

In Cairo, supporters of the deposed president blocked several roads in the central Mohandesseen neighbourhood, and were working to set up a new protest camp there, witnesses said.

Police were deployed in the area where tear gas was fired and gunshots heard.

Clashes also erupted between security forces and Morsi loyalists in the northern provinces of Alexandria and Beheira, the canal provinces of Suez and Ismailiya and the central provinces of Assiut and Menya.

In Menya, witnesses said the Saint Ibram and Virgin Mary church and the Saint Mina church were torched.

Assailants also threw firebombs at Mar Gergiss church in Sohag, a city with a large community of Coptic Christians who comprise up to 10 percent of Egypt's 84 million people, causing it to burn down, the agency said.

Coptic Pope Tawadros II, together with Al-Azhar's Tayyeb, had supported the military and sat by army chief Abdel Fattah Al Sisi when he announced that Morsi had been deposed and laid out a new political roadmap for the country.

As authorities struggled to contain the unrest in the country, Egypt's railway authorities announced that all trains had been grounded to prevent protesters from moving outside of Cairo and reassembling.

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