Drive-By Shooting In Cairo Kills One Police Officer, Injures Another

One policeman was killed and another wounded after militants opened fire at a square in the Egyptian capital of Cairo on Saturday, according to a report by Agence France-Presse (AFP). The attack comes just a day after Egyptian security forces shot dead two militants of the Sinai-based Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM) near Cairo.

“Armed men on a motorcycle opened fire on the police before fleeing,” Hani Abdel Latif, a spokesperson for the Egyptian interior ministry, told AFP.

The incident is the latest in a series of attacks targeting police and security personnel in the country since the ouster of former President Mohammed Morsi in July 2013. Since then, most of the attacks have been carried out in the northern Sinai Peninsula by militants of ABM -- a Sunni militant group that has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group.

The group had also carried out attacks on two military checkpoints in northern Sinai in October. Over 30 Egyptian soldiers were killed, making it one of the deadliest attacks on security forces since the ouster of Morsi. ABM had later published a graphic video claiming responsibility for the attacks.

On Friday, the Egyptian interior ministry had claimed that security forces killed two members of the militant group in clashes after a car carrying the militants was spotted near a checkpoint east of Cairo. “The occupants of the car opened fire to try to get away, but the police fired back … three policemen and two civilians there by chance were injured,” an interior ministry spokesperson said, adding that one of the militants killed was in charge of the group’s operations in the capital, according to media reports.