13 dead in Christian-Muslim clashes in Egypt

[News_Editor]

13 dead in Christian-Muslim clashes in Egypt

2011-03-10 00:17:29 GMT+7 (ICT)

CAIRO, EGYPT (BNO NEWS) -- Egypt's Health Ministry on Wednesday informed that 13 people were killed in the violent clashes between Egyptian Christians and Muslims on Tuesday night, the state-run MENA news agency reported.

The violent clashes took place in Egypt's capital city Cairo when Muslim men attacked thousands of Christians protesting against the burning of a church. This was the works sectarian outbreak since President Hosni Mubarak step down on February 11.

In addition, the health ministry informed that at lest 140 people were injured in the confrontation. The 13 victims died due to gunshots sustained during the clashes. It was not immediately clear how many of the dead were Christian or Muslim.

Coptic Christians were protesting the arson attack on a church in Cairo's Helwan area last week. Petrol bombs and rocks were thrown by both sides and soldiers had to fire bullets into the air to disperse them.

On Wednesday noon, the Egyptian army evacuated Cairo's Tahrir Square which witnessed days of protests. The Army has been calling on protesters to evacuate the square, but the protesters insisted on staying until all the demands of the 25 January Egyptian Revolution are fulfilled.

On New Year's Day, a suicide bombing killed 21 people in front of a Coptic church in Alexandria, causing days of protests. A week later, an off-duty policeman shot dead a 71-year-old Christian man and wounded his wife and four others on board of a bus. Coptic Christians make up about 10 percent of Egypt's 80 million population.

Last week, Egypt's military council announced that a referendum on the constitutional amendments will be held on March 19. The council took control of Egypt after Mubarak, who led Egypt as president for three decades, stepped down after weeks of anti-government protests by crowds calling for greater democracy and respect of human rights.

The Army authorities also dissolved the parliament and suspended the constitution on February 18. The council appointed a ten-member panel of independent legal experts to propose constitutional amendments to address demands of the people.

Despite the advances in Egypt, the United Nations announced the deployment of a human rights mission to the African nation in order to asses the human rights situation following the change of leadership.

In addition, the European Union said that the transition to democracy could take at least a year and not six months as planned by the transitional government as the planned period is not enough to have fair and competitive parliamentary and presidential elections.

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