Egyptian police restricted voting in areas contested by the opposition Muslim Brotherhood on Saturday and detained hundreds of Islamists trying to build on early success in parliamentary elections.
Thousands of riot police deployed in constituencies where the Muslim Brotherhood had candidates, in many cases sealing off polling stations or severely limiting the number of people who could go in and vote, witnesses said.
A leading judge told Reuters some judges had packed up in protest and taken the ballot boxes with them.
In the late afternoon in the Nile Delta city of Tanta, a line of riot police three men deep prevented people from voting.
CAMERAMAN MANHANDLED When a Reuters correspondent tried to take a photograph, police manhandled him, briefly detained him and took away the memory card of his camera.
Scattered violence marred the fourth day of voting in Egypt's long electoral process, which ends on December 7. Independent monitors said members of both the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) and the Brotherhood took part in brawls.
The elections on Saturday were especially heated after the Muslim Brotherhood, which fields candidates as independents because the government refuses to recognise it, won more seats than President Hosni Mubarak's NDP in voting last Sunday. The Muslim Brotherhood said police had detained more than 620 Muslim Brotherhood supporters since the early hours, starting with dawn raids on their homes and continuing with arrests outside polling stations.
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