Egypt, North Africa | featured news

Egyptian voters are awaiting results of the first stage of landmark parliamentary elections to be released Thursday, a day later than originally planned. The Freedom and Justice Party, a front for Egypt's powerful Muslim Brotherhood, said the bloc was in the lead following largely peaceful voting on Monday and Tuesday. But the party faces new competition from the al-Nur Party, an ultra-conservative group whose members follow the strict Salafi brand of Islam, as well as from a host of smaller parties.

"I was not sure I was going to live," says Derrik Sweeney after arriving in St. Louis. He and two others had been arrested in Cairo and accused of throwing firebombs. Three American college students detained for several days in Egypt as deadly protests swept Cairo have flown home to freedom, one describing an ordeal so terrifying he wasn't sure he would survive it.

The killing of an unarmed demonstrator by the security police on Saturday threatened to stir up new protests here as Egypt’s military rulers and political parties raced to prepare for potential chaos surrounding the parliamentary elections scheduled to start on Monday.

Clashes erupted between riot police and protesters in Cairo's Tahrir square Saturday after police dispersed a sit-in by demonstrators demanding the ruling military transfer power swiftly to a civilian government.

Egypt's government has frozen a decision requiring tourists and other visitors to apply for visas before arrival in the country, an Egyptian tourism official said Sunday.

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Hundreds of Egyptians stormed the building housing Israel's mission in Cairo and threw embassy documents and its national flag from windows, while airport sources said on Saturday that Israel's envoy was set to fly out of the country.

Hosni Mubarak's lawyer said the ousted Egyptian president has suffered a stroke and is in a coma. However, a doctor at the hospital where Mubarak has been held under arrest denied the report.

Egypt sacked nearly 600 top police officers Wednesday, the start of a promised cleansing of a force blamed for chronic abuses during the rule of Hosni Mubarak, state television reported.

Egypt will not borrow from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund after revising its budget and cutting the forecast deficit, even though a loan had been agreed, Finance Minister Samir Radwan said Saturday.

A senior Egyptian general told CNN Tuesday that officials performed "virginity checks" on women arrested during the uprising that led to former President Hosni Mubarak's ouster, the first time the authorities have admitted they performed such tests during the revolution.