Egypt's Brotherhood shifts rally venue to avoid clashes with rivals

Muslim Brotherhood to stage Tuesday rally in support of president's controversial declaration far from Cairo's flashpoint Tahrir Square to avoid clashes with rival demonstrations

The Muslim Brotherhood has declared that it would move its mass demonstration planned for Tuesday from downtown's Abdeen Square to Cairo University headquarters to avoid clashes with a rival demonstration planned to take place in Tahrir Square.
The decision was announced Sunday on the Muslim Brotherhood's official website (ikhwanonline.com), which quoted Brotherhood spokesman Mahmoud Ghozlan.
More than 30 political parties and groups are calling for mass demonstrations to take place Tuesday and for supporters to join the sit-in currently taking place in Tahrir Square to protest the constitutional declaration issued by President Mohamed Morsi who hails from the Muslim Brotherhood.
The Brotherhood in turn has called for mass demonstrations on the same day in support of the presidential decree. Their demonstration had initially been planned to take place in Abdeen Square, which is located very close to Tahrir Square where opposition demonstrations are also planned.
The controversial constitutional declaration blocks the judiciary, or any other body, from challenging Morsi's decisions. The decree also protects the Shura Council (the upper, consultative house of parliament) and the Islamist-led Constituent Assembly (tasked with drafting a new constitution) against dissolution by court order.
Commentators, critics and protesters have dubbed Morsi the "new Pharaoh," branding the new constitutional declaration as "dictatorial."
The declaration also included the dismissal of Egypt's prosecutor-general, who Morsi had attempted to remove some weeks ago but could not due to legal barriers.
Morsi also ordered the retrial of ousted president Hosni Mubarak and several of his aides implicated in the killing of protesters during last year's Tahrir Square uprising.