By Marina Makary
A conscript was injured in Suez during an exchange of fire after an unidentified armed group attacked a police patrol in Suez on Monday, state media reported.
Suez security directorate head Major General Tarek El-Gazzar confirmed the incident, adding that the “criminals responsible for the conscript’s injury will not escape punishment”, state media reported.
In a Monday statement, El-Gazzar stressed that “no citizen was injured during the exchange of fire” because of security forces presence.
The conscript currently remains in hospital.
Since the dispersal of the Rabaa Al-Adaweya sit-in supporting ousted president Mohamed Morsi in August 2013, police and army personnel, checkpoints, and institutions have come under increasing attack, causing numerous fatalities and injuries.
At the beginning of March, a police checkpoint belonging to the Traffic Police department in Talbiya in Giza was attacked by unknown assailants, and was set on fire.
In April 2014, a similar accident took place in Suez, when a police officer and a conscript were both shot dead by passengers in a vehicle.
In a recent development, the Ministry of Interior announced the arrest of seven “terrorist cells”, including 43 alleged members of the now banned Muslim Brotherhood.
The ministry said in a Monday statement that the arrested are accused of “sabotage which aimed to target the pillars of the Egyptian economy such as blowing up electricity towers, and targeting police and army officers, and judges”.
Recently, daily statements by the Ministry of Interior announced the arrest and killing of alleged “Brotherhood elements”. The accused are usually photographed in the online statements alongside homemade weapons, fireworks, guns, anti-government flyers, or literature belonging to the now outlawed group.
The 43 defendants are also charged planting bombs in several governorates, leaving several deaths and injuries.
The ministry added that the accused confessed “that elements of the Muslim Brotherhood” trained their members to use fire arms.
Responding to the accusations, the Muslim Brotherhood has repeatedly described the facts in the ministry statement as false and close to “science fiction novels”. The group, which is now designated as a “terrorist” organisation, asserts in its statements and interviews that they will not abandon peaceful strategies.
