Bomb near pyramids kills 6 Egyptian police

A BOMBING on a busy tourist road leading to Egypt’s Great Pyramids killed six police officers and wounded another three yesterday.

It is the deadliest attack on security forces in the Egyptian capital Cairo in more than six months. The bombing, near a mosque on a wide avenue often used by tour buses, hit a police checkpoint, smashing several cars.

Debris littered the area where masked troops stood guard with automatic weapons. ‘We heard the blast and rushed to the scene,’ said one observer, Abdel Hamid Abdulla. ‘Some police were injured, and some of their legs had been cut off.’

A security official said two bombs placed in the area had exploded.

A shadowy group called Hasm, or Decisiveness, which the government suspects is linked to the now-banned Muslim Brotherhood, claimed to be behind the attack. ‘There is no safety or security for you as long as we hold our weapons in jihad for God, there is either victory or martyrdom,’ the group said in a statement online.

Insurgents have carried out a number of attacks in Egypt since the 2013 military removal of an elected Islamist president.

Violence has been concentrated in the northern Sinai Peninsula where Islamic State-linked militants are battling the army.

Yesterday’s attack was the deadliest in Cairo since May when gunmen opened fire on plain clothes police officers in a van, killing eight. IS claimed responsibility.

Egypt’s president Abdel Fattah elSisi is tackling a growing financial crisis with tough economic measures which could fuel a backlash against him. He rose to power after leading the military removal of Mohammed Morsi as president three years ago.