Riot police block off some polling sites in Egypt

SANDOUB, Egypt -- Riot police battled voters Thursday, killing one person and blocking entry to polling stations in opposition strongholds in the third and final round of Egypt's legislative elections.\nPolice fired into a crowd in the Balteem district of Kafr el-Sheik, killing Gomaa el-Zeftawi, a fisherman, and wounding 60 other people, said Mohammed el-Ashqar, a campaign worker for a Nasserite opposition candidate.\nInterior Ministry spokesman Gen. Ibrahim Hamad confirmed the killing of el-Zeftawi, the second fatality since the elections began Nov. 9, but he did not give a figure for the wounded. Minutes earlier Hamad had issued a statement saying polling had "unfolded in a smooth and peaceful manner."\nIn one village, men and women determined to vote resorted to sneaking into the polling station, putting up ladders to climb over back walls -- out of sight of police barring the entrance -- and slipping through bathroom windows to get in.\nVoting proceeded normally in some towns, but in two villages visited by an Associated Press reporter -- one the hometown of a Muslim Brotherhood candidate, the other of an independent candidate -- police were blocking voters. In some southern towns, voters were intimidated by lines of police outside stations.\n"I'm calling on his excellency, the president, to appoint the members of parliament because no one has been allowed to vote. ... It would save the money wasted on elections," Sameer Fikri, a would-be voter in the village of Sandoub, said sarcastically.\nUnder U.S. pressure to bring democratic reforms, President Hosni Mubarak's government gave the banned Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest Islamic movement, considerable leeway to campaign in the early stages of the three-part elections.\nBut police interference has intensified in the later rounds, after the Brotherhood scored unexpectedly large gains, increasing its representation in parliament more than fivefold.\nIn some towns, such as the Delta city of Zagazig, where a Brotherhood candidate was favored, voting proceeded without violence or intimidation. But in several constituencies, The Associated Press saw that voters had been barred.\nIn Balteem, supporters of the Nasserite candidate Hamdeen Sabahi began pushing and shoving riot police who blocked them from the polling station. The police tried to disperse the crowd with night sticks and tear gas, but voters responded by hurling stones, el-Ashqar said.\nFinally, the police fired into the crowd, killing el-Zeftawi.\nEarlier Thursday, the Interior Ministry accused the Brotherhood of inciting violence and attacking judges in polling stations. It said heightened security measures were taken to prevent Brotherhood supporters from "terrorizing" voters for other candidates.\nHundreds of people lined up in front of a school used as a polling station in Sandoub, 75 miles north of Cairo -- the hometown of Brotherhood candidate Saber Zakher -- but they were prevented from approaching by lines of riot police armed with sticks, rifles and tear gas.\nA police lieutenant said "I don't know" when asked why both polling stations in the village had been cordoned off. An AP reporter was barred from entering to ask the judges in the polling stations.\nIn the nearby town of Bussat, the smell of tear gas hung in the air as angry would-be voters shouted at police blocking the station. "There are no human rights here, only war and destruction," said resident Mustafa Mohammed. Behind the polling station, men and women clambered up ladders over the wall.\nFaisal Ibrahim Hassanein, an independent candidate not connected to the Brotherhood, is running against a candidate from the ruling National Democratic Party in the Bussat area.\nMore than 10 million Egyptians were eligible to vote in Thursday's third and final round, where the last 136 of parliament's 454 seats were being contested. Runoff elections will be held Dec. 7 in districts where no candidate gets at least 50 percent of the vote.