NBC News: A hot air balloon carrying foreign tourists crashed near the ancient city of Luxor, killing 19 people, a government official confirmed Tuesday.
Initial reports say the hot air balloon caught on fire mid-air before crashing to the ground, General Mamdough Khaled, director of security for Luxor Governate said in a statement. Luxor International Hospital received 19 badly burned bodies, Khaled said.
BREAKING: Egyptian president annuls decree expanding powers
Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi has annulled the controversial constitutional decree he issued in November expanding his powers.
The decision came after a Saturday meeting between Morsi and other political leaders. The decree and a referendum on the draft constitution sparked mass protests throughout Egypt in the past two weeks. The referendum on the draft constitution will continue as planned on December 15. Read more from AFP.
Italian police find stolen Egyptian sphinx
BBC: Italian police say they’ve recovered a stolen 2,000-year-old Egyptian sphinx near Rome. They believe the statue was going to be taken out of the country.
The sphinx was found along with other artifacts thought to have been stolen from an Etruscan cemetery. Rome began importing sculptures from Egypt after its conquest of the country in the 1st century BC.
Photo credit: AFP
The New York Times: With Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - a key ally of Damascus - sitting beside him, Egypt’s President Morsi spoke of an ‘oppressive regime’ in Syria and said the opposition should unite in its effort to unseat President Bashar Assad.
’I am here,’ he said, ‘to announce our full and just support for a free, independent Syria that supports a transition into a democratic system and that respects the will of the Syrian people for freedom and equality at the same time, preventing Syria from going into civil war or going into sectarian divisions.’
Photo: President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, left, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India, right, listened as President Mohammad Morsi of Egypt delivered remarks in Tehran. (Raouf Mohseni/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images)
Mohammed Morsi wins Egypt presidential election
NBC News, msnbc.com news services:
Islamist Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood was elected president of Egypt with 51.7 percent of last weekend’s knife-edge run-off vote, defeating former Mubarak accolyte Ahmed Shafiq, the state election committee said on Sunday.
Photo: Supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood’s presidential candidate Mohammed Morsi gather as they await the result of the election in Tahrir Square. (Ahmed Jadallah / Reuters)
Mubarak sentenced to life in prison
The Associated Press reports that Egypt’s ex-President Hosni Mubarak has been sentenced to life in prison after a court convicted him on charges of complicity in the killing of protesters during last year’s uprising that forced him from power.
AP Photo/Amr Nabil
WWII fighter plane found 70 years after crashing in Sahara Desert
NBC News and MSNBC.com: A well-preserved fighter plane that crashed in Egypt’s Sahara Desert during World War II has been found 70 years later, shedding new light on the pilot’s struggle to survive.
Photo: Jakub Perka via msnbc.com
The Associated Press
Thousands of women marched through central Cairo Tuesday demanding Egypt’s ruling military step down in an unprecedented show of outrage over soldiers who dragged women by the hair and stomped on them during a fierce crackdown on activists.
(Source: youtube.com)
At least 24 people have been killed and more 200 injured in the centre of Cairo after a protest over an attack on a church erupted into the worst violence since the 18-day uprising that ousted Hosni Mubarak as president of Egypt in February.
Trouble began when a demonstration against the attack in southern Egypt was reportedly met by gunfire close to the state television building.
Fighting spread to Tahrir Square and surrounding streets. Hospitals where the wounded were being treated also came under attack.
State television announced that a curfew was being imposed on the city’s downtown area and Tahrir Square, the epicentre of the February uprising that overthrew the former president. The curfew would last from 2am to 7am (midnight to 5am GMT) on Monday.
Appealing for calm after more than 1,000 security force personnel were deployed, interim prime minister Essam Sharaf said: “What is taking place are not clashes between Muslims and Christians but attempts to provoke chaos and dissent.”
“The only beneficiary of these events and acts of violence are the enemies of the January revolution and the enemies of the Egyptian people, both Muslim and Christian”
Man wears a necklace made of spent tear gas canisters in Tahrir Square, Egypt. Photo by Andy Carvin posted on Flickr.
Egyptian police firing tear gas in a new round of protests at Tahrir Square. Photo by @JonathanRashad posted on Twitpic.
