Egypt: Two killed in Cairo clashes
- Published
Two people have been killed in clashes between protesters and police in the Egyptian capital, medics have said.
The two men were hit by gunshots on the edge of Cairo's Tahrir Square at dawn, reports said. One died at the scene and the second in hospital.
More than 50 people have died in clashes in cities across Egypt in the past week, the deadliest violence since President Mohammed Morsi took office.
Critics accuse him of betraying the revolution, which he denies.
On Tuesday, Egyptian army chief Gen Abdul Fattah al-Sisi warned that the current political crisis could lead to the collapse of the state.
President Morsi was meeting German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin on Wednesday but has cut the length of his visit to a matter of hours because of the crisis, cancelling plans for a trip to Paris on Friday.
'Serious dialogue'
In Cairo, scuffles continued in the early hours of Wednesday morning between police, who used teargas, and protesters, who threw stones at security officers.
One man was fatally shot on Qasr Al-Aini Bridge and another was hit in Abdel Moneim Riyadh Square, according to a Health Ministry official.
"Our demand is simply that Morsi goes and leaves the country alone. He is just like Mubarak and his crowd who are now in prison," 28-year-old protester Ahmed Mustafa told Reuters.
Violence has spread to several Egyptian cities after beginning in Cairo on the eve of last Friday's second anniversary of the revolution. The worst of the unrest has been in the Suez Canal city of Port Said, in rioting prompted by death sentences passed on 21 local people over football riots.
Mr Morsi's imposition of a night curfew in Port Said, as well as the cities of Suez and Ismailiya, have been largely ignored with tens of thousands of residents taking to the streets.
In a Tweet, Nobel peace laureate and founder of the Constitution Party, Mohammed ElBaradei said the president needed to take steps to stop the violence.
"We need an immediate meeting with the president, ministers of defence and interior, the ruling party, the Salafist movement and the National Salvation Front to take urgent steps to stop violence and start a serious dialogue," he wrote.