BEIRUT, Jan 25, 2007 (AFP) - Clashes broke out Thursday between government and opposition supporters at a university in Beirut, causing some injuries and forcing the army to cordon off the area, police said.

The fighting erupted at Beirut Arab University in a southern sector of the capital between students wielding clubs and throwing rocks, an AFP correspondent said.

A police spokesman said some people were injured but did not say how many.

Those involved were followers of the Future Movement led by anti-Syrian parliamentary majority leader Saad Hariri and opposition supporters of the Shiite fundamentalist Hezbollah movement and its ally Amal.

The fighting began on the main campus and then moved out on to the street, as students set fire to tyres in the roads in order to block traffic. Army troops fired into the air to break up the crowds and cordoned off the neighbourhood.

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