CAIRO (AFP) - Egyptian police fired tear gas to break up clashes between supporters of ousted president Mohamed Mursi and residents of a central Cairo neighbourhood, Agence France-Presse (AFP) correspondents said.

The clashes began when dozens of religious scholars affiliated with Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood entered the ministry of endowments and were ordered out by police, a security official said.

They then clashed with residents of the area prompting police to fire tear gas, the official and AFP correspondents said.

The scholars were joined by more pro-Mursi protesters who damaged shop fronts. That further infuriated the residents, who pelted them with stones, leading to sporadic scuffles on several streets.

The confrontations come as Mursi supporters demonstrated outside several government ministries in Cairo.

Loyalists of the deposed Islamist president have set up two huge protest camps in Cairo and have held near daily demonstrations calling for his reinstatement, after his overthrow by the military on July 3.

"It is a continuation of our revolutionary actions against the coup. It will continue," Brotherhood official Farid Ismail told AFP of the protests.