Egypt: Several Protesters Reported Dead in Cairo Operation

By Staff Writer

Cairo--- Dozens of supporters of the deposed Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi are reported to have died, after security forces moved in to clear protesters occupying two sit-in camps in the capital, Cairo.

Supporters of Muslim Brotherhood party have been occupying Nahda Square and the Rabaa al-Adawiya sites since Mr Morsi was ousted on 3 July, demanding for his reinstating.

The brotherhood party said more than 100 people had died, but the authorities put the death toll much lower. The party has described the security forces intervention as a “massacre”.

The state TV aired images of armoured bulldozers moving deep into the main campoutside the eastern Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque where many of the casualties were claimed.

An eyewitnessata field hospital outside the mosque used by Morsi’s supporters said that 120 people had died

The interior ministry said an operation to empty the streets around Nahda Square of the protesters way underway after they had been cleared from the square. The ministry has denied any deaths were caused by its forces firing live ammunition.

Security forces used only tear gas canisters to disperse the protesters though it was heavily fired at by armed elements from inside the two protest camps, causing the death of an officer and a conscript and the injury of four policemen and two conscripts," the ministry said in a statement.

Large columns of smoke rose over parts of the city as operation to drive out protesters from the sit-in camps continued, with tear gas canisters fired and helicopters hovering above.

The clearing operation follows an earlier declaration by the interior ministry saying that the security forces would take necessary measures against the protest camps.

In the statement the ministry said it was keen not to shed any Egyptian blood, and that a safe exit would be provided for protesters, except for those wanted by the prosecution.

Several of the Brotherhood leaders have been arrested since Morsi’s was forced out of power, in a military-backed coup. The opposition had accused him of putting interests of his Muslim Brotherhood party, ahead of the country's as a whole, as well as failing to resolve country’s worsening economic crisis.

Morsi’s Islamist-led government was forced to exit over failure attracting nationwide protests earlier in the week. President Morsi's opponents accuse him of putting

More than 250 people have been killed in clashes with the security forces in the six weeks since Mr Morsi's overthrow.

Egypt's Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy said the sit-ins could not continue "endlessly", and that authorities are trying to seek an agreement through dialogue.