Post date: Jul 08, 2013 10:26:50 AM
More than forty people killed when Army opens fire on Mursi supporters.
CAIRO, EGYPT (JULY 8, 2013) (REUTERS) - The death toll in violence on Monday (July 8) at the Cairo headquarters of the Republican Guard rose to 42, Egyptian state television said, after the Muslim Brotherhood accused the security forces of attacking protesters.
The Egyptian military said "a terrorist group" had tried to storm the building. Onearmy officer was killed and 40 wounded, the military said.State television reported that an additional 322 people were wounded in what it described as an attempt to storm the Republican Guard's headquarters.
Bodies were taken to Nasser City Hospital. One injured man said he was hit by a tear gas canister:
"I was outside the barracks near the entrance, and I saw people coming at me, so I looked over my shoulder so that I could run. But when I faced back to the front a tear gas canister hit me in the face. Blood was coming out of my face so I lay on my back. Then a soldier attacked me and hit me with the butt of his rifle on my leg, and said we have to cleanse the square of all of you today," said Mohamed Ali.
The bloodshed deepened Egypt's political crisis, escalating the struggle between the army, which overthrew Mursi last Wednesday after mass demonstrations demanding his resignation, and the Brotherhood, which has denounced what it called a coup.
The Muslim Brotherhood called on Egyptians to rise up against those who "want to steal" the revolution, a statement by its political wing said on Monday.
"(The Freedom and Justice Party) calls on the great Egyptian people to rise up against those who want to steal their revolution with tanks and armoured vehicles, even over the dead bodies of the people," a statement on the party's Facebook page said.
Military vehicles sealed off traffic in a wide area around the Rabaa Adawia mosquewhere Mursi supporters led by senior Brotherhood leaders have been staging protests since his ouster.
The army also closed two of the main bridges across the Nile River with armoured vehicles, witnesses said.
Talks on forming a new government were already in trouble before Monday's shooting, after the Nour party rejected two liberal-minded candidates for prime minister proposed by interim head of state Adli Mansour.
Nour, Egypt's second biggest Islamist party, which is vital to give the new authorities a veneer of Islamist backing, said it had withdrawn from the negotiations in protest at what it called the "massacre at the Republican Guard (compound)".