Religious violence continues

At least 80 people were also wounded in the clashes in Cairo on Sunday. The Muslim Brotherhood blamed unnamed parties for attempting to broaden instability in Egypt by igniting sectarian violence and spreading chaos.

State news agency MENA, citing the Health Ministry, said the man killed was 30-year-old Mahrus Hanna Ibrahim Tadros - a Coptic name.

Five people, including one Muslim, were killed in religious violence to the north of Cairo on Saturday.

Sunday's clashes began after hundreds of Christians left St. Mark's Coptic Orthodox Cathedral to march following the funeral of Christians killed Saturday. Residents of the area pelted them with rocks and firebombs and fired birdshot, forcing them back inside the complex. Arriving police fired tear gas, with some canisters landing inside the cathedral grounds and causing panic while people outside the church cheered.

"I consider any attack on the cathedral as an attack on me, personally," Muslim Brotherhood-allied President Mohammed Morsi said in a statement.

Coptic Pope Tawadros II, who left the cathdral that usually serves as his headquarters during the violence, issued a statement calling for calm. In his own statement, Morsi said he had spoken to the Coptic leader by phone. The president ordered authorities to guard the cathedral and citizens in the area, saying that protecting the lives of Muslims and Christians was a state responsibility.

Coptic Christians compose about 10 percent of Egypt's estimated 90 million people. Attacks against the group have increased since the 2011 overthrow of the autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Further violence erupted in Khossous Sunday, leaving 12 residents and one police officer injured.

Prosecutor protests, train strikes

Elsewhere in Egypt, officials continued to question the legitimacy of the country's top prosecutor. On Sunday, the Supreme Judiciary Council body urged him to step down less than five months after Morsi appointed him. Days earlier, a court had declared his appointment void.

A statement from the Council urged Talaat Abdullah "to express a wish" to return to his previous job as a judge for the sake of unity. The prosecutor made no immediate response. However, government officials indicated that he would appeal the court's decision to remove him.

Abdullah's appointment in December set off protests by judges and fellow prosecutors that forced him to tender his resignation, which he then withdrew. Since then, the mostly secular opposition has demanded his removal. Sunday's request by the Council appeared to offer him another chance to leave.

During the past two weeks, the prosecutor has issued summons against several celebrities critical of Morsi, Egypt's first freely elected president. Those taken in include the satirist Bassem Youssef, accused of insulting Morsi and Islam and since released on bail.

Egypt's economic troubles also came into focus on Sunday as train drivers and conductors went on strike to demand better pay. The action led to crowded train stations packed with thousands of angry passengers.

mkg/msh (AFP, Reuters, dpa, AP)