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CAIRO: At least 25 people were killed and many injured in a blast near Cairo’s main Coptic church on Sunday, Egyptian security sources say told media. The cause of the blast was not immediately known.
Egyptian media quoting Sources from the church said the majority of those killed were women, as well as two young children
The attack came two days after a bomb elsewhere in Cairo killed six policemen, an assault claimed by a shadowy group that authorities say is linked to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. Islamic militants have targeted Christians in the past, including a New Year’s Day bombing in Alexandria in 2011 that killed at least 21 people.
Egypt’s official MENA news agency said an assailant lobbed a bomb into a chapel close to the outer wall of St. Mark’s Cathedral, seat of Egypt’s Orthodox Christian church and home to the office of its spiritual leader, Pope Tawadros II.
photos: DAILY NEWS EGYPT
However, witnesses said the explosion may have been caused by an explosive device planted inside the chapel. Conflicting accounts are common in the immediate aftermath of attacks.
The attack came as Cairo was still reeling from an attack on a checkpoint in Giza on Friday, which left at least six security personnel dead.
A source from within the cathedral told Daily News Egypt on condition of anonymity that they expect the number of casualties to rise.
“The explosion took place at 10:00am inside the church hall,” the source said. “There was heavy smoke coming from inside the building … there was screaming and body parts everywhere. Ambulances arrived on the scene and took the dead and wounded to El Damrdash and El Shefaa hospitals.”
Sources from the church asserted that the majority of those killed were women. Two young children between the ages of three and four were also killed in the explosion.
At the time of print no preliminary report of the incident was available, and how the perpetrator managed to carry out the attack is still unknown.
Talks are currently ongoing between the president’s security and anti-terrorism adviser Ahmed Gamal El-Din and the director of Giza security Kamal El-Daly about replacing Minister of Interior Magdy Abdel Ghaffar, sources told Daily News Egypt.
Contradictory statements have been published by local media outlets regarding the attack on the cathedral, with one outlet reporting a woman had entered the cathedral and placed the IED in the women’s section.