Egypt crisis: Cairo braced for rival protests

Egypt's capital Cairo is steeling itself for rival rallies sparked by a referendum on a new constitution ordered by President Mohammed Morsi.

The demonstrations have been called by largely secular opposition groups and Islamists backing Mr Morsi.
At least nine people were hurt early on Tuesday when shots were fired at opposition protesters in central Cairo.

President Morsi has called in the army to maintain security and protect state institutions ahead of Saturday's vote.
The opposition wants the referendum scrapped, arguing that the constitution was drafted by an Islamist-dominated assembly, weakens human rights and fails to guarantee women's rights.
The president has tried to calm public anger by annulling a 22 November decree boosting his powers, but has given the army powers to arrest civilians over the next few days.
However, some rulings of his controversial decree - which stripped the judiciary of any right to challenge his decisions - will stand.
The general prosecutor, who was dismissed, will not be reinstated, and the retrial of former regime officials will go ahead.

Clashes feared

Petrol bombs were thrown and shots fired at opposition demonstrators camping in Tahrir Square in the early hours of Tuesday.
Nine people received limb injuries from the unidentified attackers, while another protester suffered a head injury, Al-Misri al-Yawm newspaper reported.
After the attack, police cars were deployed around the square for the first time this month.
The destination of Tuesday's opposition protests marches will be the presidential palace, the scene of earlier demonstrations which has now been surrounded with concrete blocks and ringed with tanks.
An umbrella group calling itself the Alliance of Islamist Forces - made of Muslim Brotherhood and Salafist groups - was due to gather at two mosques in Nasser City, a suburb of Cairo.
The Muslim Brotherhood was reportedly hoping for two "million-man" marches to converge in support of the referendum and the president, under the slogan: "Yes to legitimacy".
Although their route was unclear, spokesman Mahmoud Ghozlan told state-owned al-Ahram newspaper that there was no plan to head for the presidential palace.
Islamist demonstrators have also been staging a sit-in outside a Cairo media complex that hosts the studios of several private TV channels, which pro-Morsi protesters accuse of bias.
Eight people died and hundreds more were wounded in clashes between rival protesters outside the palace last Wednesday night.
There are fears there could be more violence if rival groups of protesters come face to face, the BBC's Jon Leyne in Cairo reports.
Because several anti-Morsi marches have been organised across Cairo, they could potentially cross paths with the main pro-Morsi demonstrations.
Protests have also been planned in the cities of Alexandria and Assiut.

Weakened force

The army presence on the capital's streets has also raised fears Egypt is moving back towards military rule, our correspondent says.
President Morsi granted the army powers of arrest on Sunday until the results of Saturday's referendum were announced, calling on the military to co-ordinate with the police in maintaining security.
The police, seen as a weakened force since the fall of ex-President Hosni Mubarak, failed to intervene when anti-Muslim Brotherhood protesters ransacked the Islamist movement's Cairo headquarters last week.
By pressing ahead with a referendum on the constitution, the president says he is trying to safeguard the revolution that overthrew the former president last year, but critics calling for large turnouts at Tuesday's protest accuse him of acting like a dictator.
The opposition National Salvation Front has said it will not recognise the draft constitution, as it was drafted by an assembly dominated by Mr Morsi's Islamist allies.
NSF chief co-ordinator Mohammed ElBaradei said the "sham" draft constitution defied Egyptians' "basic rights of freedom".
"It doesn't establish proper democratic systems, so at this stage at least we have decided that we are going to continue to fight tooth and nail against the referendum," the Nobel prize winner told the BBC.
Mr ElBaradei would not go so far as to call for a boycott of Saturday's vote, but said he hoped the turn-out at Tuesday's protests would persuade Mr Morsi to postpone the referendum until consensus was reached through dialogue on a "proper, democratic" constitution.
Meanwhile, Mohamed Soudan, foreign relations secretary of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, said Mr Morsi was constitutionally bound to go ahead with Saturday's vote because the date had been announced by the constituent assembly.