12 Killed as Egypt Police Storm Militants
Twelve people were killed Wednesday when about 350 police employing armored vehicles stormed two apartment buildings where Muslim militants fighting to turn Egypt into a purist Islamic state had barricaded themselves.
Security sources in Asyut, 200 miles south of Cairo, said one of the dead was a 23-year-old militant believed to have led a campaign of attacks on foreigners that has ravaged Egypt’s tourist industry.
Blood soaked the ground outside a bullet-pocked building where the leader, Ahmed Zaki, and four other militants barricaded themselves in a ground-floor apartment after fleeing a nearby building and then fought gun battles with police for nearly 12 hours.
Police operations against militants have already made this the bloodiest month in a year of surging political violence in Egypt. A total of 28 militants, 11 police and three bystanders have died in raids in Cairo, Aswan and Asyut.
Security sources put the casualty toll in Asyut at 10 militants and two police killed and 24 police injured, nine seriously.
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