Mourning, protests in Cairo after 26 die in religious unrest

By Nehal El-Sherif, dpa

   Cairo (dpa) - Thousands of mourners gathered Monday at the Cathedral of Abbasiya, Egypt's biggest church, for the funeral of some of those who died in clashes between mostly Coptic Christians and government troops.

Funeral at the Abassiya Cathedral in Cairo/epa

   Twenty-six people were killed in the violence that took place in front of the state television building in Cairo late Sunday. The Health Ministry said nearly 300 people were wounded.

   A woman, dressed in black, was shouting inside the church: "We did not do anything for them, why did this happen to us."

   The mourners then headed to the Coptic Hospital nearby to join other protesters who were waiting to receive the bodies of their relatives.

   On Sunday, about 2,000 people had gathered in Cairo for an initially peaceful rally to protest the destruction of a church in southern Egypt last month. But fighting soon broke out among the protesters, residents and troops.

   US President Barack Obama was "deeply concerned" about the violence, the White House said in a statement. "Now is a time for restraint on all sides so that Egyptians can move forward together to forge a strong and united Egypt," it said.

   "As the Egyptian people shape their future, the United States continues to believe that the rights of minorities - including Copts - must be respected, and that all people have the universal rights of peaceful protest and religious freedom," the White House said.

   In New York, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called for Egypt's transitional authorities to "guarantee the protection of human rights and civil liberties for Egyptians of all faiths."

   Egypt's Coptic church, headed by Pope Shenuda III, blamed "infiltrators" for starting the clashes and said no action had been taken to solve the problems of the country's minority.

   Christians account for 10 per cent of Egypt's 80 million people, and tensions are not uncommon with the country's Muslim majority.

   "The Christian faith denounces violence. Some strangers infiltrated ... and commit the wrongs for which the Copts have been blamed," the church said in a statement.

   The Copts feel these problems occur repeatedly without the perpetrators being held to account, the law being enforced or the root causes of the problems being resolved, it added.

   Shenuda called on Coptic Christians to begin a three-day fast on Tuesday to mourn the dead.

   In a televised address Monday, Prime Minister Essam Sharaf called on religious figures for assistance in ending the violence. 

   "Instead of going forward to build a modern democratic nation, we found ourselves searching for security and stability," Sharaf said.

   "No one will go backwards, and we will not believe that what happened is sectarian sedition, this is just one scene of a conspiracy," he said.

   meanwhile, the prosecution began questioning 25 detainees suspected of being involved in the violence. They face charges of disturbing public security, inciting sectarian strife, using firearms without a license, attacking security men and murder.

   Adel Saeed, the attorney general's spokesman, said the prosecution had ordered autopsies to be performed on the victims' bodies.

   The benchmark stock index, EGX30, dropped by 2.25 per cent on Monday, ending the session with a loss of more than 5 billion Egyptian pounds (850 million dollars).

   The day's trading session began with a 5.1-per-cent decline, forcing the Egyptian Exchange to halt trade on more than 25 companies for half an hour after their shares plummeted by more than the 5 per cent limit.

   The latest violence, which comes ahead of parliamentary elections scheduled for November 28, is the most deadly since the January 25 revolution that forced president Hosny Mubarak to resign.

   In March, 13 people were killed in sectarian clashes in Cairo shortly after a church was torched in the village of Sol, south of the capital.

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