Tear gas fired as Egyptian Islamists target security HQ

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian security forces fired tear gas to disperse a small group of hardline Islamist protesters who were attempting to scale the walls of the state security headquarters in a Cairo suburb late Thursday night.

Around 2,000 protesters from several Salafi Islamist groups had staged a protest earlier on Thursday night outside the security headquarters against what they said was a return to the force's pre-revolution methods.

After security forces fired tear gas, the remaining protesters, some of whom had also attempted to break into a nearby police officers' club, left the area.

The protest points to lingering suspicion harbored by the hardliners about security agencies used against them by ousted President Hosni Mubarak, and which, they say, Islamist President Mohamed Mursi has been unable to reform.

The protesters, some waving the black-and-white al Qaeda flag, chanted slogans against Mursi and accused him of building a security apparatus no different from the old one.

Earlier, at the height of the protest, no police presence was visible outside the security headquarters, where protesters tore down Interior Ministry flags and erected several al Qaeda flags and set off fireworks.

A small group had earlier on Thursday evening attempted to break down a door on the headquarter's perimeter but gave up before causing damage to the door. A Jewish Star of David was drawn by some protesters on the wall's perimeter.

The Salafi groups had issued a statement earlier in the day saying state security organs had returned to "criminal practices" such as summoning citizens for investigation, threatening the achievements of the 2011 uprising.

Egypt dissolved the feared and hated state security apparatus, which had been used by Mubarak's administration to crush political opposition, including Islamists who were repressed under the old guard, the month after he was toppled.

It was replaced by a new National Security Force, which the Interior Ministry promised would serve the nation without interfering in the lives of citizens or their right to exercise their political views.

The protesters had marched from a nearby mosque after evening prayers. Some chanted to onlookers in apartments on streets clogged by the march "come down from your houses, state security is Mubarak".

The system of law and justice has been a major stumbling block in post-Mubarak Egypt. A rift between the Islamist rulers and the judiciary, which Islamists see as controlled by Mubarak loyalists, is steadily widening amid a broader struggle over the future character of the country.

Earlier on Thursday, an Egyptian judge referred a complaint filed by a police spokesman against popular hardline Islamist cleric Hazem Salah Abu Ismail to the state security prosecution, setting a hearing for Saturday to begin the investigation.

State newspaper Al-Ahram reported that the complaint called for Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim to arrest Abu Ismail on charges of "terrorizing police officers" after Abu Ismail urged his supporters to attend Thursday's protest.

The police spokesman's complaint added that such demonstrations hindered officers in their work to protect national security.

(Reporting by Abdelrahman Youssef and Ali Abdelaty; Writing by Maggie Fick and Tom Perry; Editing by Alison Williams and David Brunnstrom)

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Arrested Islamists suspected of planning attack in France

PARIS (Reuters) - Three suspected Islamist militants arrested in southern France appeared to be planning an attack in the days ahead, the Paris prosecutor said on Monday, the anniversary of an al Qaeda-inspired shooting that rocked France.

Police found weapons and explosives at the home of one of the suspects in the town of Marignane, near Marseille, and intercepted communications between the men suggested they were close to going into action, prosecutor Francois Molins said.

The three men, who were taken in for questioning last week with a fourth man who was later released, were to be placed under formal investigation later on Monday.

"The investigation showed we were faced with a veritable laboratory for making improvised explosive devices and, even if we had no evidence of a precise plan, the messages exchanged by the participants suggested the timetable could be accelerated," Molins told reporters.

The timing of the arrests was poignant, coming exactly a year after 23-year-old gunman Mohamed Merah began a rampage that killed three Jewish children, a rabbi and three soldiers in the southern city of Toulouse. He was subsequently tracked down and killed in a shootout with police.

Speaking as Defence Minister Le Drian led a memorial ceremony in Toulouse for Merah's first victim and posthumously awarded him the prestigious "Legion d'Honneur" medal, Molins said the arrested men, in their 20s, wanted to emulate Merah.

"It was clear they were training themselves in making explosives based on a jihadist radicalization, a glorification of Mohamed Merah, and an affirmed desire to go into action."

France, which centralizes its terror investigations in Paris, is on high alert for any home-grown militant activity since its military intervention against Islamist fighters in Mali in January prompted threats of retaliatory action.

(Reporting by Catherine Bremer and Patrick Vignal; editing by Mark Heinrich)

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Nigerian forces say they have killed 52 Islamists, arrested 70

KANO, Nigeria (Reuters) - Nigerian security forces said on Saturday they had killed 52 Islamist militants over 10 days of fighting in the northeasterly Borno state, at a cost of only two of their own men, with no civilian deaths.

The announcement came a day after President Goodluck Jonathan paid a visit to the state in which he rejected the idea of an amnesty for the Islamist sect Boko Haram, which has killed hundreds in gun and bomb attacks in the past two years.

The Islamists are seen as the main security threat to Africa's top energy producer, although their sphere of influence is far from the crucial oil fields in the south.

Lieutenant Colonel Sagir Musa, spokesman for the mixed military and police joint task force (JTF) in Borno state, said in a statement that a series of operations had been conducted against Islamists over the past 10 days.

"During these operations under the period stated, there were exchanges of fire that led to the death of 52 Boko Haram terrorists including 10 commanders of the sect," he said.

"Seventy terrorists were also arrested."

He said the JTF had also seized a number of weapons.

It was not possible to verify the claims independently. Nigerian forces often claim substantial successes against Boko Haram militants but rarely admit to significant losses on their own side or civilian casualties during their operations.

Residents of Maiduguri, Borno's largest city, say dozens of civilians die in military raids against Boko Haram, and rights groups accuse the JTF of heavyhandedness and extrajudicial killing.

A Nigerian Islamist splinter group from Boko Haram, based in the northwest, said on Saturday it had killed seven foreign hostages seized last month from a construction firm's compound in northern Nigeria.

Nigerian authorities said they had no information on any such killing, and doubted the veracity of the statement.

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