Soldiers have stormed an anti-government protest camp in Cairo, prompting a series of violent clashes that have killed at least two people and injured more than 220 others, witnesses and state television report.

Protesters set cars alight and threw stones at military police in the Egyptian capital, after a wounded activist said that he had been arrested and beaten by soldiers at a sit-in near the parliamentary building earlier.

Clashes began at dawn on Friday, as soldiers began firing shots in the air in order to try and disperse around 300 demonstrators, who had been angered by video that appeared to show the activist badly beaten after his arrest.