By MAGGIE HYDE
Associated Press
CAIRO (AP) - Hundreds of supporters of ousted Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi took to the streets Friday to protest the decision by the country's former military chief to run in upcoming presidential elections, sparking scattered clashes that claimed the lives of a journalist and two other people.
The former military chief Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi led the ouster of Morsi in July after millions joined demonstrations demanding he step down. El-Sissi resigned from the military on Wednesday, the same day he made his much-anticipated announcement launching his presidential campaign. He is widely expected to win.
Friday's rallies took place in several cities, including areas in and around the capital of Cairo and in the northern city of Alexandria. Demonstrators attempted to block a main road with burning tires in Cairo that leads to the famed Giza pyramids, but security officials said they were able to bring the situation under control.
In the eastern Cairo district of Ain Shams, security forces fired tear gas to disperse protesters. Three people were killed, including a female journalist named Mayada Ashraf who died while covering the clashes there, a security official said.
A 39-year-old protester named Mohammed who was at the site of the clashes said that Ashraf was steps away from him which she was shot in the head by security forces using live ammunition. Giving only his first name out of fear of retribution, he said the area was a focal point for several rallies from nearby areas and has been the site of deadly clashes in the recent months.
Ashraf works for the privately owned daily el-Dustor newspaper. It reported online that it had urged authorities to halt gunfire in the area to give ambulances a chance to retrieve the body of the slain journalist.
A second news portal that Ashraf contributed to, Masr al-Arabiya, or Arab Egypt, posted a video purportedly showing the journalist with her headscarf soaked in blood as she was being carried away over a protester's shoulder.
Interior Ministry spokesmen were not immediately available to comment on protesters' claims that police fired on them with live ammunition.
Authorities arrested 38 supporters of the former Islamist president Morsi at protests in the cities of Giza, Mansoura and Minya, according to a security official. The officials said students from the Islamic university of Al-Azhar threw rocks and Molotov cocktails at security forces.
Dozens of el-Sissi's supporters also rallied in Alexandria and Cairo on Friday, waving Egyptian flags and raising posters bearing his picture.
In his first interview following his resignation, published Friday in the Egyptian al-Watan and Kuwaiti al-Rai papers, el-Sissi said that he knows there's a huge responsibility ahead for him. He said he would offer "a practical plan that could be implemented in reality on the short term."
"The people bore a lot the past few years and it's time to harvest the fruit of two revolutions," he said.
Supporters of Morsi and his group, the Muslim Brotherhood, said Thursday they will continue protests against what they called el-Sissi's "republic of fear."
In the Suez Canal city of Port Said, security officials said two unidentified assailants on a motorcycle torched a stand built by locals supporting el-Sissi that was being used to distribute campaign materials.
All of the security officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
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