AhlulBayt News Agency

source : PressTV
Thursday

29 September 2016

12:06:36 PM
782199

Three Egyptian officers along with civilian killed in Sinai

Gunmen have killed at least three policemen and a civilian in Egypt’s restive Sinai Peninsula, says the interior ministry.

(AhlulBayt News Agency) - Gunmen have killed at least three policemen and a civilian in Egypt’s restive Sinai Peninsula, says the interior ministry.

The deadly assault was carried out in the city of el-Arish, the provincial capital and the largest city of North Sinai, on Wednesday, the ministry stated.

The assailants, riding in a vehicle, intercepted a taxi transporting the officers, who were shot dead along with the driver, the statement added.

The shooting attack was the latest in a series of assaults against Egypt’s security forces in the restive region, where militants affiliated with the Daesh Takfiri terrorists are active.

There has been no claim of responsibility for the Wednesday attack. However, the assault had the hallmarks of Velayat Sinai, a terrorist group affiliated with Daesh.

Egyptian forces have been engaged in operations to rid the Sinai Peninsula of militants over the past few years.

Since September 2015, Egypt’s military has launched a high-scale security operation against militant positions in northern Sinai following coordinated terrorist attacks on several army checkpoints that claimed the lives of 21 soldiers in July the same year.

A state of emergency was declared across the whole peninsula in October 2014, following a deadly assault that claimed the lives of over 30 Egyptian soldiers.

Previously known as Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, Velayat Sinai has claimed responsibility for most fatal attacks targeting the Egyptian army and police in the capital Cairo and the Sinai Peninsula.



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