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Masked gunmen have attacked a group of Coptic Christians in southern Egypt, killing 26 people and wounding 25 others as they were driving to a monastery, the country's Health Ministry said.
Key points:
- 26 killed, 25 wounded as militants attacked buses
- Group of Coptic Christians was travelling to a monastery
- Muslim leaders including Hamas have condemned the attacks
The group was travelling in two buses and a small truck on Friday in Minya province, which is home to a sizeable Christian minority, medical sources and eyewitnesses said.
Eyewitnesses said the Copts were attacked as they were going to pray at the monastery of Saint Samuel the Confessor in the western part of the province.
They said masked men stopped the vehicles on a road leading to the monastery and opened fire.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi called a meeting of security officials, the state news agency said, and the cabinet said the attackers would not succeed in dividing the nation.
Muslim leaders — including the militant Palestinian group Hamas, which is seeking to improve relations with neighbouring Egypt — condemned the attack.
Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum in a statement on Friday called the shooting "an ugly crime," of which "the enemies of Egypt" were the only beneficiaries.
The grand imam of al-Azhar, Egypt's 1,000-year-old centre of Islamic learning, said the attack was intended to destabilise the country.
Targeting of Coptic Christians continues
Coptic Christians, who make up about 10 per cent of Egypt's population of 92 million, have been the subject of a series of deadly attacks in recent months.
About 70 have been killed in bomb attacks on churches in the cities of Cairo, Alexandria and Tanta since December.
Those attacks were claimed by Islamic State.
Reuters/AP
Topics: terrorism, unrest-conflict-and-war, crime, murder-and-manslaughter, egypt
First posted