CAIRO
– Clashes broke out between police and members of Egypt’s largest
opposition group Saturday and authorities arrested hundreds of Muslim
Brotherhood members as tensions intensified ahead of next week’s
parliamentary elections.
At least 10 people were injured when
baton-wielding police dispersed a rally for local candidate Mohammed
Fayyad in Sharqiya province, north of Cairo, said Abdel Galil
el-Sharnoubi, a spokesman for the Brotherhood.
In a separate
incident, police stopped a Brotherhood procession for candidate Simary
Mansour in the town of Abu Kibeer, also in Sharqiya, and damaged 12 cars
and seized seven others, the group’s website reported.
It also said that police attempted to disperse a rally in the port city of Alexandria with tear gas and rubber bullets.
The
fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood is the top rival to the ruling party
of President Hosni Mubarak heading into the Nov. 28 vote. Many in Egypt
fear it will see the same widespread violence that plagued the last
parliamentary elections, in 2005, when police and government-backed
vigilantes stopped people from casting ballots and clashed with rivals.
A
security official said that 117 people were arrested Saturday for
demonstrating without a license in Fayyoum, Sharqiya an… >>>
