CAIRO (AP) - Police in Egypt say a teenager was killed after a quarrel broke out between Muslims and Coptic Christians in the Nile Delta town of Mansoura.

Police say the trouble began with a verbal exchange between the
Muslim teen and a Coptic street vendor. Officials say Coptic youths
joined in the quarrel, the teenager was killed in the ensuing fight, and Muslim rioters then attacked Christian homes, setting two houses ablaze.

Police said some 25 rioters were arrested, and Egypt's ministry of the interior, which oversees security, dispatched hundreds of armed soldiers from nearby towns to police Mansoura.

Egyptian Christianity dates to the apostolic era, but today's Coptic Christians complain of persecution by the nation's Muslim majority.

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