Tear gas shrouded the streets outside the Sunni Muslim
world's most prestigious university after Egyptian police battled thousands of
pro-Muslim Brotherhood
demonstrators Sunday in Cairo, authorities reported.
There were no immediate reports of injuries from the
protest, the latest in a wave of sometimes-deadly demonstrations since the
summer coup that deposed Egypt's first democratically elected president.
About 3,000 students from Cairo's al-Azhar University,
considered a top center of Islamic scholarship, blocked a road outside the
institution, according to Egypt's Interior Ministry. After about half an hour
of attempts to persuade them to reopen the roadway, the protesters refused and
began chanting anti-military slogans and throwing rocks, the ministry said on
its Facebook page.
Police responded with tear gas, driving some protesters back
onto the university grounds and arresting others.
Egypt's military stepped in to remove President Mohamed
Morsy in July amid protests that brought hundreds of thousands to the streets
to demand his resignation. Morsy, who had won office barely a year earlier, and
other Brotherhood leaders have been arrested, and a court banned the movement
in September.
But the demonstrations have continued, with Morsy's
supporters demanding that the generals reinstate his government. Battles
between police and protesters left more than 50 dead in early October, spurring
the Obama administration to cut off significant military aid to a leading Arab
ally.
Egypt's military-backed interim president is reviewing a
proposed law that would place strict limits on protests, state-run news outlets
reported last week.
The legislation has drawn the ire of human rights groups and
both pro- and anti-Morsy political movements. The April 6 Youth Movement, an
influential political force deeply involved in Egypt's 2011 revolution, called
it "one of the worst repressive laws constraining freedoms in Third World
countries and military dictatorships."
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