73 killed as riot erupts at soccer match

Seventy-three people were killed and at least 1,000 injured on Wednesday after a soccer pitch invasion in the Egyptian city of Port Said, in what a minister called the biggest disaster in the nation’s soccer history.

It was the deadliest incident of football violence since Oct 16 1996, when 78 died and 180 were injured in a stampede in Guatemala City before a World Cup qualifier between Guatemala and Costa Rica.

Angry politicians and sports officials decried a lack of security at the match between Port Said team al-Masry and Al Ahli, blaming the nation’s leaders for allowing — or even causing — the tragedy.

Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the head of the country’s ruling military council, ordered two helicopters be sent to Port Said to fly out some of the Al Ahli soccer team and fans, military sources said.

The helicopters would transfer the injured to military hospitals.

Violence at football matches across North Africa has increased significantly since political unrest began sweeping the region over a year ago, and one player described Wednesday’s riot as “a war, not football”.

The trouble flared at the end of a match, in which al-Masry beat Al Ahli 3-1.

“This is unfortunate and deeply saddening. It is the biggest disaster in Egypt’s soccer history,” said deputy health minister Hesham Sheiha.

Witnesses said that trouble broke out when Ahli fans unfurled banners insulting Port Said and an Ahli supporter came onto the pitch carrying an iron bar. Al-Masry fans reacted by pouring onto the pitch and attacking Ahli players. They then turned to the terraces to attack Ahli supporters.

Most of the deaths were among people trampled in the crush of the panicking crowd or who fell from terraces, witnesses said.

Live television coverage showed fans running onto the field and chasing Ahli players. A group of riot police formed a corridor to try to protect the players, but they appeared overwhelmed and fans were still able to kick and punch the players as they fled.

“This is not football. This is a war and people are dying in front of us,” Ahli midfielder Mohamed Abo Treika told his club’s television channel. “There is no movement and no security and no ambulances,”

“I call for the Premier League to be cancelled. This is horrible situation and today can never be forgotten.”

Al Ahli striker Sayed Hamdi told state television: “It was an atmosphere of terrorism.”

State television reported that Egypt’s football federation had indefinitely suspended all matches.

Albadry Farghali, a member of parliament for Port Said, accused officials and security forces of allowing the disaster, saying they still had ties to the government of President Hosni Mubarak, who was overthrown a year ago.

“The security forces did this or allowed it to happen. The men of Mubarak are still ruling. The head of the regime has fallen but all his men are still in their positions,” he screamed in a telephone call to live television.

A number of policemen were among the dead, a medical source said.

Hospitals throughout the Suez Canal zone were put on a state of emergency, and dozens of ambulances rushed to Port Said from the Canal cities of Ismailia and Suez, said an official in local ambulance service.

Initial reports from police said that 47 people had been arrested.

Another match in Cairo was halted by the referee after receiving news of the violence in Port Said, prompting fans to set parts of the stadium on fire, television footage showed.