CAIRO (AP):Egypt's prosecutor general defied a presidential decision to remove him from his post, entering his office yesterday in a downtown Cairo courthouse flanked by security and hundreds of judicial officials.

President Mohamed Morsi had ordered Prosecutor General Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud to step down in an apparent bid to appease public anger over the acquittals of ex-regime officials accused of orchestrating violence against protesters last year.

Morsi appears to have broad public support for removing Mahmoud, who was appointed under ousted president Hosni Mubarak.

But the prosecutor and a powerful judges' club said this infringes on the judiciary's independence, as Egyptian law protects the judicial officials such as the prosecutor general from being fired by the president.

To overcome the constraints on removing him, Morsi asked Mahmoud to become ambassador to the Vatican. But Mahmoud refused to be reappointed.