CAIRO, May 5, (Agencies): Egypt’s military on Saturday ordered 300 people detained over deadly clashes between troops and anti-military protesters in Cairo and imposed a new overnight curfew, a military source told AFP.
Military prosecutors said the 300, including nine journalists, “will be held for 15 days pending investigation” into clashes in the Abbassiya district on Friday that left two people including a soldier dead and at least 300 injured.
A security official confirmed the number and said more arrests could be made on Saturday.
The military also imposed an overnight curfew in the defence ministry district for a second successive night, which will go into effect from 2100 GMT on Saturday until 0400 GMT on Sunday, the source said.
After hours of questioning overnight, those held were accused of assaulting army officers and soldiers, assembling in a military zone and preventing members of the armed forces from carrying out their work, the source said.

They all denied the charges.
Friday saw fierce clashes between anti-military protesters and troops near the defence ministry.
The clashes erupted just three weeks ahead of Egypt’s first presidential elections since a popular uprising ousted president Hosni Mubarak last year.
The army deployed around Cairo’s Defence Ministry on Saturday to deter protesters after a soldier died and 373 people were wounded in clashes during demonstrations against Egypt’s ruling generals, less than three weeks before a presidential vote.

Debris
Cleaners swept up debris after Friday’s violence in the Abbasiya district where streets were calm but strewn with rocks and other projectiles hurled by protesters at troops, who fired teargas and charged the crowd to drive them from the ministry.
It was the second time in a week that clashes had erupted near the ministry where protesters had gathered to vent their anger over the army’s handling of Egypt’s troubled transition from army rule to civilian government. Eleven people were killed on Wednesday.
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said at least 18 journalists had been assaulted, injured or arrested while covering the clashes.
“We call on the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to identify the attackers and bring them to justice immediately, as well as to release journalists in custody,” Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa programme coordinator, said in a statement issued late on Friday.
A presidential election, which starts on May 23-24, will choose a replacement for Hosni Mubarak, who was toppled in February last year. Generals have governed since then but their rule has been punctuated by violence and political bickering.

Many protesters who gathered near the ministry were ultra-orthodox Salafi Muslims furious that a sheikh they backed for president was disqualified from the race. Liberals and others were also there, accusing the army of seeking to manipulate or delay the vote.

The military has dismissed those allegations, insisting it will stick to its timetable of handing over power to a new president by July 1, or even earlier in the unlikely event of an outright winner in the first round of voting this month.

“Our mission ends with a successful handover of power, and we will not let anyone change the declared schedule,” an army source told the website of the state-owned Al-Ahram daily.

Egypt’s military ruler, Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, arrived on Saturday at the funeral of a soldier killed in clashes between troops and anti-military protesters, an AFP reporter said.
The soldier, a member of a special forces unit, was killed on Friday during clashes at the Al-Nur mosque in central Cairo, members of his unit told AFP.

The clashes erupted just three weeks ahead of Egypt’s first presidential election since a popular uprising ousted president Hosni Mubarak last year.

The ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, headed by Tantawi, imposed an overnight curfew in the Abbassiya area near the defence ministry where the fierce fighting took place.
Two people, including the soldier, were killed and almost 300 wounded in the clashes, the health ministry said.

Egypt’s military prosecution said on Saturday it would release all women detained a day earlier in deadly Cairo clashes outside the defence ministry, a military official told AFP.
“The military judiciary has decided to release all the women,” he said. He did not say how many women were detained in Friday’s clashes between soldiers and anti-military protesters, but activists put the number at between 14 and 17.

The military said it detained 300 people after the intense clashes that left two people dead according to hospital officials, including one special forces soldier.
The clashes came less than three weeks before the country holds its first presidential election since an uprising ousted president Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, leaving the military in charge.

Ambassador
Saudi Arabia’s ambassador is returning to Cairo a week after he was recalled following a wave of protests against the detention of an Egyptian lawyer, the embassy said Saturday.
The ambassador’s recall and the closure of the kingdom’s missions in Egypt was the worst diplomatic row between the two countries in decades.
The unexpected Saudi diplomatic break came following days of protests by hundreds of Egyptians outside the Saudi Embassy in Cairo and consulates in other cities to demand the release of Ahmed el-Gezawi. Relatives and human rights groups say he was detained for allegedly insulting the kingdom’s monarch.

Saudi authorities denied that and said he was arrested for trying to smuggle anti-anxiety drugs into the conservative oil-rich kingdom.

The embassy said Ambassador Ahmed Kattan will be in Egypt later Saturday, a day after the kingdom’s monarch met with an Egyptian delegation that traveled to Riyadh to heal the rift.

“We will not allow this passing crisis to go on for long,” King Abdullah said Friday according to Saudi official media. “The repercussions of the recent events on the relations between the two countries pained every honorable Saudi and Egyptian.”

Egypt’s ruling military generals have criticized demonstrators for endangering relations between the two countries. Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador and shut its diplomatic missions after what it said were “unjustified” protests that violated the missions and threatened staff.

The lawyer’s case had revived long-standing resentment over the treatment of Egyptians working in Saudi Arabia, which is a destination for more than a million Egyptians searching for better jobs. Occasional bouts of tension over mistreatment of Egyptians in the kingdom have plagued the relations, but they have never reached such an extent.

Saudi officials have increasingly viewed Egypt’s post-revolution trajectory — particularly the political gains by the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood — as worrisome trends that could encourage greater opposition in the Gulf.

The Egyptian delegation arrived in Saudi Arabia on Thursday. The delegation of over 100 Egyptian personalities was led by the speaker of the Islamist-dominated parliament Saad el-Katatni, also a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.

El-Gezawi was still in custody in Saudi Arabia. El-Katatni told a Saudi newspaper, Okaz, that the parliament won’t interfere in the lawyer’s case and that they have confidence in the Saudi judiciary.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia’s top religious official has blamed Muslim sinfulness for instability in the Middle East, where pro-democracy unrest has toppled four heads of state.

“The schism, instability, the malfunctioning of security and the breakdown of unity that Islamic countries are facing these days is a result of the sins of the public and their transgressions,” Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdulaziz Al al-Sheikh was quoted as saying by al-Watan newspaper.

In a Friday sermon, he accused “chaotic” people of wearing mask of “democracy and equality” for actions leading to injustice and instability within the umma, or Muslim nation.

Revolts that erupted last year have removed Arab autocrats in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen and are still raging in Syria and Bahrain. They gave voice to millions of people who suffered decades of repression but have alarmed Gulf Arab rulers.

Ties between Riyadh and Cairo were strained by the fall of President Hosni Mubarak, a close Saudi ally, and by the rising power of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, an organisation viewed with suspicion by many Gulf governments.

On Friday an Egyptian delegation visited Saudi King Abdullah to smooth a spat caused by protests at the Saudi embassy in Cairo, which had led to the recall of the Saudi ambassador. The king later ordered the envoy back Cairo and the embassy said he would return on Saturday.

Last month, the grand mufti was criticised after international media quoted him as saying all churches in the Arabian Peninsula should be destroyed, angering Christian bishops in Austria, Germany, and Russia. The comments could not be verified by Saudi officials.