By Tom Perry and Yusri Mohamed, Reuters
Opponents of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi planned mass demonstrations on Friday, raising the prospect of more bloodshed despite a pledge by politicians to back off after the deadliest week of his seven months in office.
Protests marking the second anniversary of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak have killed nearly 60 people since January 25, prompting the head of the army to warn this week that the state was on the verge of collapse.
The country's most influential Islamic scholar hauled in rival political leaders for crisis talks on Thursday and persuaded them to sign up to a charter disavowing violence and committing to dialogue as the only way to end the crisis.
But barely had those talks at a medieval university ended, when Morsi's foes called for new nationwide protests, including a march on the presidential palace in Cairo, which his followers see as a provocative assault on a symbol of his legitimacy.
"We are going out tomorrow, to Tahrir, and there is a group going to the palace," said Ahmed Maher, a founder of the April 6 youth protest movement which helped bring down Mubarak in 2011.
At least two more people were killed in clashes in Egypt. The violence forced President Mohammad Morsi to cut short a trip to Europe and return to Cairo. NBCNews.com's Dara Brown reports.
"We also confirm our peacefulness and that weapons must not be used, because we see that violence, weapons and Molotovs have cost us a lot," he added after attending the talks.
In a statement released overnight, leftist leader Hamdeen Sabahi said signing the peace initiative did not mean an end to the protests. He would not enter dialogue until bloodshed was halted, the state of emergency lifted and those responsible for the previous week's violence brought to justice.
"Our aim ... is to complete the goals of the glorious January revolution: bread, freedom and social justice," he said.
Protesters accuse Morsi of betraying the spirit of the revolution by concentrating too much power in his own hands and those of his Muslim Brotherhood, a decades-old Islamist movement that was banned under Mubarak.
The Brotherhood accuses Morsi's opponents of trying to bring down Egypt's first democratically elected leader and to seize power through street unrest that they could not win through the ballot box.
The rise of Morsi, an elected Islamist, after generations of rule by authoritarian, secular military men in the most populous Arab state, is probably the single most important change of the past two years of Arab popular revolts.
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On the second anniversary of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak, huge crowds take to the streets in five cities.
But seven months since taking power after a narrow election victory over a former general, Morsi has failed to unite Egyptians and protests have made the country seem all but ungovernable. The instability has worsened an economic crisis, forcing Cairo to drain currency reserves to prop up its pound.
Cairo's streets were still quiet Friday morning, with protesters expected to gather following afternoon prayers.
The violence has been worst in cities along the Suez Canal, especially Port Said, where demonstrators were enraged by death sentences handed down against 21 soccer fans on Saturday for stadium riots a year ago that killed more than 70 people.
Protesters plan to demonstrate at the stadium on Friday, the first anniversary of the riots, said Mahmoud Naguib, an activist in the April 6 movement. They also plan other marches after midnight to defy the curfew.
"We have one demand: that Morsi and the interior minister go on trial for inciting the killing of protesters in Port Said," Naguib said.?
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