In Egypt witnesses say 23 people are dead and 150 people injured after riot police clashed with Christian protesters, angry at the burning of a church in the south of the country.

At least 23 people were killed and dozens more than 100 were wounded in Cairo as security forces fought angry Christian protesters demonstrating against the burning of a church in the south of the country.

Christians threw rocks and petrol bombs and set cars on fire in some of the most violent scenes since an uprising ousted ex-president Hosni Mubarak in February.

Hundreds from both sides fought with sticks on a Cairo bridge. Protests carrying crosses and pictures of Jesus later spread to the central Tahrir Square, the focal point of the February uprising.
There were scenes of mayhem at a hospital where many of the dead and injured were taken and soldiers later enforced a curfew in large areas of central Cairo.

The ruling military council has promised to protect all Egyptians while the country deals with a transition between a revolution and elections, but Egypt's minority Christians say the council is doing nothing to stop attacks on their churches and people by radical Islamists.

"They fired at my colleague. He was standing next to me... Christians, sons of dogs," a wounded soldier said on state television.

ABC correspondent Ben Knight says he counted at least 17 bodies in the morgue at the hospital.
"It obviously got very, very bad, very, very quickly. We saw police and army vehicles on fire, but we also saw images of police and army vehicles driving through the crowd," he told ABC News 24 Breakfast.
"We came to this Coptic Christian hospital and in the morgue, I counted 17 dead bodies... there was absolutely horrific trauma to these bodies.

"This is a whole city and a whole country that has been simmering with tension for a long time."
He says the violence has "absolutely shattered" the centre of Cairo.

Egypt's government has appealed for calm. Prime minister Essam Sharaf said he had contacted security and church authorities to contain the situation.
Christians, who make up 10 per cent of Egypt's roughly 80 million people, took to the streets after blaming Muslim radicals for partially demolishing a church in Aswan province last week.