A police officer was killed and two others were injured Tuesday morning during clashes armed groups in Sharqeya governorate, north east of Cairo.
The assailants are still at large; however the ministry is intensifying efforts for their arrest.
A similar attack took place in October in Sharqeya as well, where a police officer was shot and killed as he was heading home from work by masked gunmen on a motorcycle.
Also in March, two police officers were critically wounded by two gunmen on a motorbike. A third officer managed to mortally wound one of the attackers, a 29-year-old theology student.
Since the ouster of former president Mohamed Morsi on 3 July 2013 attacks on police officers across the country have been on the rise. Reprisal attacks across the country, especially in rural Upper Egypt and the Sinai peninsula, targeted police stations, police officers, and military forces.
In February, the governorate witnessed four similar attacks on police officers in one week, leaving three police officers dead.
Former prime minister Hazem El-Beblawi said at the time that such attacks reflected “the bankruptcy of terrorist elements”.
