CAIRO — When Amru Salahuddien stepped onto the Cairo University campus on April 14, student supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi had begun marching toward the main gate. Riot police were stationed outside, and troops and armored vehicles flanked the other gates.

Police fired tear gas at the main gate, said Salahuddien, a photojournalist for the Chinese news agency Xinhua. Then he heard the firing of automatic rifles. Most of the students ran, he said, scattering across the campus. But some remained near the main gate, ducking behind palm trees and thick concrete columns, throwing back hot tear gas canisters. A female student was shot in the leg and fell, he told Al-Monitor.

“An armored vehicle approached the main gate and the soldiers began shooting from the ports in the vehicle's body. I took cover behind a palm tree and kept photographing,” he said. “Three students were shot, most probably with shotgun fire. Later on, police noticed me along with three colleagues. For a whole minute, police kept firing at us. I could see the wood chips flying because of the bullets that hit it.”

Khaled Hussein, a photographer for the privately owned newspaper Youm7, was shot when he tried to move from behind a car, Salahuddien said. His newspaper reported he took a gunshot wound to his chest. Amr Abdel-Fattah, who works for the private television station Sada El-Balad, was wounded by birdshot, according to Al-Ahram, which also reported that one student was shot to death.