CAIRO: A police conscript was killed from his injuries after being shot by allegec smugglers in North Sinai, announced the Facebook page of the Ministry of Interior Friday.
Rabei Mostafa, a soldier at the Central Security Department in North Sinai, was trying to confront a number of outlaws attempting to illegally infiltrate at the international border mark 11, when he was fatally shot, read the statement by the ministry.
The shooting took place late on Thursday. Security forces have launched a hunt after the perpetrators of the shooting.
More than 500 security personnel have been in killed in several militant attacks launched in the northern tip of the peninsula, since the military-backed ouster of the President Mohamed Morsi in July 2013.
The Egyptian military has launched a magnified joint campaign with the police to combat the significant rise in militancy in the area, under which hundreds of militants have been announced killed, and many smuggling tunnels have been destroyed.
The first phase of the “Right of the Martyr” military operation, which was carried out in 16 days, has been finalized after killing 535 “terrorists,” and arresting 634 wanted persons, dismantling 478 bombs, and destroying 613 “terrorist hubs,” 111 armed vehicles, 250 motorcycles and 38 explosive storehouses, the military announced on Sept. 22.
A state of emergency in North Sinai has been extended twice, each for three months, since it was first imposed in October 2014; it is set to end by October 26, 2015.