1 killed in clashes during Egypt's constitutional poll

A person was killed during clashes between supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi and security forces in Upper Egypt's Beni Suef governorate while residents were voting on a new draft constitution on Tuesday, a health ministry official told Xinhua. "A young man was shot dead during a protest against the referendum near a polling station in Naaser town in Beni Suef, south of Cairo," said Khaled al-Khatib, head of the Emergency Central Administration. He added that another one died of a heart attack while standing in a long queue waiting to cast his vote at Ain al-Seira district in southern Cairo. A pro-Morsi alliance led by the Muslim Brotherhood, which has been branded by the government as a "terrorist group," announced it would boycott the referendum and stage anti-government mass protests during the two-day vote. In response, the government deployed more than 380,000 security men in addition to 650 special forces to protect polling stations and voters and to swiftly face emergency cases. Egyptians headed to polling stations in the country's 27 governorates on Tuesday morning to vote on the new constitution that is meant to replace the one drafted and approved under the ousted Islamist president and his Brotherhood group. A lot of Egyptians consider the new charter a prerequisite for stability and security in the turmoil-stricken country, while Islamists, who condemn Morsi's ouster as a coup, decided to boycott the referendum as "illegitimate."