Father says Egyptian boy dies of wounds in clashes

CAIRO, July 31 (Reuters) A 15-year-old Egyptian boy died today of gunshot wounds sustained during anti-government protests between Sinai Bedouin and Egyptian police a day earlier near the border with the Gaza Strip, his father said.

Mohamed Arafat said the protest was against government plans to evacuate houses near the border with Gaza. Egypt has already evacuated buildings within 50 metres of the border for security reasons but denies planning further measures.

Arafat told Reuters police had shot his son, Ouda, in the chest and pelvis during the protest in the village of Massoura near the border town of Rafah.

''Do not call me Mohamed Arafat anymore. Call me the father of the martyr,'' he said over the telephone. ''What is happening here is injustice beyond your imagination.'' Witnesses and security officials said 16 civilians were injured in the clashes that lasted about three hours. Some of them were shot and others suffered teargas inhalation.

Security officials and hospital sources said today that 20 policemen were also injured. Three of them went to intensive care, they said.

Footage of the clashes obtained by Reuters tofay showed hundreds of protesters, many of them children and youths, throwing stones at riot police and battering an empty traffic checkpoint. The video shows a police motorcycle ablaze and the demonstrators setting fire to tyres.

Police marched on the crowd with armoured cars, fired teargas canisters and fired in the air.

Egyptian border guards now use houses within 50 metres of Gaza to monitor the border to try to curb smuggling of weapons, drugs and contraband into Gaza. Officials said the owners of the houses were compensated.

The protesters were also demanding title to the farmland they work, permits to build houses, pardons for sentences imposed by military courts, the early release of imprisoned Bedouin and a waiver of debts to the state agricultural bank.

The Bedouin of north Sinai have become increasingly assertive about their grievances against the government in Cairo and have staged several large protests this year, mainly to demand the release of detainees.

The police detained thousands of Bedouin after a series of bombings at tourist resorts in Sinai between 2004 and 2006. The authorities have released about 60 people. The Bedouin say the number is not enough.

REUTERS ARB VC1906