Egypt's highest court has suspended its work indefinitely, intensifying a conflict between some of the country's top judges and the head of state.
The Supreme Constitutional Court's announcement came hours after it postponed a ruling on the legitimacy of an Islamist-dominated panel that drafted a disputed new constitution for the country.
Several thousand supporters of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi gathered outside the Nile-side courthouse in Cairo to prevent judges from entering.
The court said yesterday was "the blackest day in the history of Egyptian judiciary".
Yesterday's developments were the latest in an unfolding confrontation between Mr Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood supporters on one side, and his mainly secular political opponents and the judiciary on the other.
Mr Morsi adopted sweeping new powers in a November 22 decree that stripped the judiciary of any power to challenge his decisions, so it is unclear what effect any ruling would have.
The Supreme Constitutional Court said it would not convene until its judges could operate without "psychological and material pressure", saying protesters had stopped the judges from reaching the building.
Supporters of Mr Morsi had protested outside the court through the night ahead of a session expected to examine the legality of parliament's upper house and the assembly that drafted a new constitution, both of them Islamist-controlled.
The cases have cast a legal shadow over the president's efforts to chart a way out of a crisis ignited by the November 22 decree, which temporarily expanded his powers and led to nationwide protests. The court's decision to suspend its activities appeared unlikely to have any immediate impact on his drive to get the new constitution passed in a referendum on December 15.
Three people have been killed and hundreds more wounded in protests and counter-demonstrations over the decree.
At least 200,000 of Mr Morsi's supporters attended a rally at Cairo University on Saturday. His opponents were also staging an open-ended sit-in in Cairo's Tahrir Square, the cradle of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak in February last year.
Mr Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood, which propelled him to power in a June election, hope to end the crisis by pushing through the new constitution hastily adopted by the drafting assembly on Friday. Mr Morsi has called a referendum and urged Egyptians to vote.
"The Muslim Brotherhood is determined to go ahead with its own plans regardless of everybody else. There is no compromise on the horizon," said Hassan Nafaa, a professor of political science at Cairo University.
Outside the Supreme Constitutional Court, Muslim Brotherhood supporters rallied behind the referendum date. "Yes to the constitution", declared a banner held by one protester.
The protest reflected the deep suspicion harboured by Egypt's Islamists towards a court they see as a vestige of the Mubarak era.
The same court ruled in June to dissolve the Muslim Brotherhood-led lower house of parliament. Since then, several cases have challenged the legitimacy of the upper house of parliament and the 100-member constituent assembly that wrote the constitution.
Judges supervise voting in Egypt, so Mr Morsi now needs them to oversee the referendum. Vice-president Mahmoud Mekky has said he is confident the judges will perform that role, though Mr Morsi's critics in the judiciary may call for a boycott.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article