Egyptian police shot dead four militants and arrested two others accused of involvement in the mid-July killing of five policemen, the interior ministry said Wednesday.
Egypt’s security forces have been the target of repeated attacks by jihadist groups since the army overthrew former Islamist president Muhammad Mursi in 2013.
Police had been tracking militants suspected of opening fire on a police car south of Cairo on July 14, leaving a non-commissioned officer, three conscripts and a police employee dead.
On Wednesday, the ministry said police had simultaneously approached suspects at two different hideouts in the capital.
One group of suspects, in western Cairo’s 6th of October district, opened fire as police approached. Four of the militants were killed in the ensuing gunfight, it said.
In Faisal neighborhood, also in western Cairo, police arrested two militants, it added.
The ministry did not say when the operations had taken place.
Egypt has been fighting an insurgency by an Daesh group affiliate based in North Sinai province, where hundreds of soldiers and policemen have been killed since Mursi’s ouster.
At the same time, new groups have attacked security forces in other parts of the country, including the Hasam group — an extremist movement the government says is linked to Mursi’s outlawed Muslim Brotherhood
source:Arab News