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Thursday, 2 February 2012

Egypt football riot: Three days' mourning for dozens killed


Egypt's ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has announced three days of national mourning after at least 74 people died in clashes between rival football fans in the city of Port Said.
Hundreds more were injured as fans invaded the pitch after a match between top-tier clubs al-Masry and al-Ahly.
Emergency meetings of the cabinet and parliament have been called.
Protest marches are being planned for Thursday against the police's inability to contain the violence.
One al-Ahly fan told the BBC that fans will march from the al-Ahly's club in Cairo to the Interior Ministry.
"People are angry at the regime more than anything else... People are really angry, you could see the rage in their eyes," Mohammed Abdel Hamid said.
Hundreds gathered at Cairo's main railway station to receive the injured arriving from Port Said, with some chanting slogans against military rule.
Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, the head of Egypt's ruling army council, went to a airbase near Cairo to meet al-Ahly players who were flown back from Port Said on a military aircraft.
"This will not bring Egypt down... These incidents happen anywhere in the world. We will not let those behind it go," he said, according to Associated Press.
It is the biggest disaster in the country's football history, said the Egyptian deputy health minister.
"This is unfortunate and deeply saddening," Hesham Sheiha told state television.
Some of the dead were security officers, the Associated Press news agency quoted a morgue official as saying.
BBC

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