Two police officers killed in twin Cairo blasts

Cairo, June 30 (IANS) Two police officers were killed and several other security personnel were wounded in two blasts near the presidential palace in Cairo's Heliopolis district Monday, media reported.

Colonel Ahmed al-Ashmawi, a bomb disposal expert at the Cairo security directorate, was killed and four security men were injured while defusing one of two bombs planted in the vicinity of the presidential palace in eastern Cairo, Xinhua reported citing the online edition of state-run Ahram newspaper, adding one bomb was successfully defused.

Later, another police lieutenant was killed when a third primitive bomb went off as security forces tried to defuse it near the presidential palace. Several security men were wounded and an officer was seriously injured.

Egypt's Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim mourned the martyrs and said "the attacks will only increase police's determination to combat terrorism".

A security source was quoted by state TV as saying that the first two home-made bombs were discovered incidentally near a dust bin, while the third was planted near the wall of the place the bomb disposal team was combing in the vicinity of the presidential palace.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attacks.

A jihadi group named Ajnad Misr or Soldiers of Egypt has claimed a string of attacks on police in Cairo.

Monday's explosions came two days after a blast hit a construction site of a telecommunications building in the 6th of October City outside Cairo, killing a girl and her mother. The father of the killed girl was the guard of the building.

On Wednesday, at least six people were injured in small explosions near metro stations on the capital's outskirts and outside a court complex near the presidential palace.

Since the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, a wave of militant attacks and explosions targeting security personnel and public institutions have been taking place mainly in the restive Sinai peninsula. But recently, the attacks have crept into the capital and Nile delta cities.

The Al Qaeda-inspired Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis claimed responsibility for most of the attacks, saying they were taking revenge for the police crackdown on Morsi's supporters which left more than 1,000 people dead.

Monday's explosions came while the country marks the anniversary of toppling Morsi and his Brotherhood group following mass protests over his turbulent one-year rule.

It was not immediately clear if President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who led Morsi's ouster, was inside the palace at the time of the explosions.