CAIRO (Reuters) – Militants killed three policemen and injured five others in a shooting in Cairo late on Monday, the interior ministry said on Tuesday.
Attacks on security forces are common in Egypt’s northern Sinai, where the country is battling an Islamist insurgency, but targeted assaults in Cairo are rare and the shooting comes amid a campaign by militants to spread violence to the country’s mainland.
The militants drove by and shot down police stationed at an intersection of the ring road, a busy Cairo expressway, in the city’s eastern neighborhood of Nasr City, the statement said.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack. It comes just weeks after two Islamic State suicide bombers killed at least 45 in deadly church bombings in Alexandria and Tanta, one of the bloodiest attacks the country has experienced in years.
(Reporting by Mohamed El Sherif; Writing by Eric Knecht; Editing by Peter Cooney)
