Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has said he would like to resign immediately but fears the country would descend into chaos if he did so.
In his first interview since anti-government protests began, he told ABC News he was "fed up" with power.
But he warned that the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood party would fill any power vacuum if he stepped down.
Cairo has seen another day of violence with clashes between the president's opponents and supporters.
Stones were thrown on both sides, and there has been some gunfire.
The army, which was trying to separate the two sides, appears to have failed to control the crowds.
Egypt's Health Minister Ahmed Samih Farid said that eight people had died in the fighting, which began on Wednesday, and 890 were injured, nine of them critically.
Another person was later reported killed in clashes on Abdel Monem Riyad Square, also in central Cairo. Many more were injured.
The BBC's Khaled Ezzelarab in Cairo says the shift in focus from Tahrir Square to Abdel Monem Riyad Square appears to indicate a strategic advance for the anti-Mubarak protesters, who have managed to hold their ground in Tahrir and move the clashes elsewhere.
Foreign journalists reporting for several organisations were attacked, with reports of Mubarak supporters said to have stormed a number of Cairo hotels.
Some journalists were beaten with sticks and had their equipment smashed.
The New York Times said that two reporters had been released after being detained overnight on Thursday.
Later in the evening, a number of political activists were arrested by military police, as well as representatives of Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.