Egypt crisis: Militants kill 25 cops in Sinai
20 Aug 2013 9:58 PM GMT
Suspected militants on Monday ambushed two minibuses carrying off-duty policemen in Egypt’s northern Sinai Peninsula, killing 25 of them execution-style and wounding two, security officials said.
The killings, which took place near the border town of Rafah, compound Egypt’s woes a day after police fired teargas to free a prison guard from rioting detainees, killing at least 36.
The deaths of the 36 detainees and the 25 policemen take to nearly 1,000, the number of people killed in Egypt since Wednesday’s simultaneous assaults on two sit-in protest camps by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.
In Monday’s attack in Sinai, the militants forced the two vehicles to stop, ordered the policemen out and forced them to lie on the ground before they shot them to death, the officials said.
The policemen were in civilian clothes, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
The deaths of the prisoners on Sunday, who were captured during clashes in the past couple of days around Cairo’s central Ramses Square, came as military chief General Abdel-Fatah el-Sissi vowed that the military would stand firm in the face of the rising violence but also called for the inclusion of Islamists in the post-Morsi political process.
There was initial confusion over how the Sinai ambush had happened, and the officials at first said the policemen were killed when the militants fired rocket-propelled grenades at the two minibuses carrying the men.
Such confusion over details in the immediate aftermath of attacks is common. Egyptian state television also reported that the men were killed execution-style.
The killings, which took place near the border town of Rafah, compound Egypt’s woes a day after police fired teargas to free a prison guard from rioting detainees, killing at least 36.
The deaths of the 36 detainees and the 25 policemen take to nearly 1,000, the number of people killed in Egypt since Wednesday’s simultaneous assaults on two sit-in protest camps by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.
In Monday’s attack in Sinai, the militants forced the two vehicles to stop, ordered the policemen out and forced them to lie on the ground before they shot them to death, the officials said.
The policemen were in civilian clothes, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
The deaths of the prisoners on Sunday, who were captured during clashes in the past couple of days around Cairo’s central Ramses Square, came as military chief General Abdel-Fatah el-Sissi vowed that the military would stand firm in the face of the rising violence but also called for the inclusion of Islamists in the post-Morsi political process.
There was initial confusion over how the Sinai ambush had happened, and the officials at first said the policemen were killed when the militants fired rocket-propelled grenades at the two minibuses carrying the men.
Such confusion over details in the immediate aftermath of attacks is common. Egyptian state television also reported that the men were killed execution-style.
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