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| Africa: North | |
| Egypt names Sharm el-Sheikh bomber | |
| 2005-07-27 | |
| Egyptian investigators said yesterday they had identified a man suspected to be one of the bombers who died in the Sharm El Sheikh attacks as Cairo denied the involvement of Pakistani nationals. Many aspects of the investigation were shrouded in mystery three days after the blasts, with no clear direction emerging in the probe so far, contradictory information on the casualty toll and three different claims for the attacks. Security sources said investigators suspect a known Sinai Islamist called Yusef Badran was one of the suicide bombers involved in the triple bomb attacks in the Red Sea resort on Saturday, the deadliest in Egypt. DNA tests were being carried out on his family and compared with the remains of the suspected Ghazala Gardens hotel bomber, the most devastating of the strikes. Badran had already been suspected of involvement in another wave of attacks that killed at least 34 people in the Sinai resorts of Taba and Nuweiba further north last October. His family in the Sinai town of Al-Arish said he had been missing for months. âHe was arrested after the Taba bombings and later released,â his mother-in-law Mariam al-Sawarta said. âBut I know nothing about his situation. He is married and lived in a village called Al-Metni, south of Al-Arish.â Egyptian forces have been combing the Sinai since Saturdayâs bombings, arresting around 200 people. Interior Minister Habib al-Adly said as early as Saturday there could be links between the Sharm El Sheikh bombings and the anti-Israeli attacks in Taba. Meanwhile officials fiercely denied the involvement of any Pakistani nationals in the triple bombings.
In a twist that heightened fears of a new wave of co-ordinated global Al Qaeda-linked terror attacks after the July 7 carnage in London, Egyptian security sources had said Monday that six Pakistanis who entered the country earlier this month were being sought over the Sharm bombings. Their pictures were among those of dozens of suspects posted in police stations in the Sharm El Sheikh area and in Cairo. But Sharawi said security services never distributed the pictures. Egyptâs ambassador to Pakistan Hussein Haridy said he had informed Islamabad âthat no Pakistani national was involved in the terrorist acts that rocked Sharm El Sheikh late last Saturday.â Adlyâs first adviser, Mohamed Sharawi, also said the six Pakistanis mentioned in media reports were not linked to the bombings. âIt seems the government has no serious leads and it cannot conceal its unease,â Dhiaa Rashwan, from the Al-Ahram Centre for Strategic Studies said. Three days after the bombs ripped through the glitzy beach and dive resort, a question mark also hung over the death toll, with the health and tourism ministries saying 67 people had perished. âThe death toll stands at 67, among them 16 foreigners,â tourism ministry spokeswoman Hala al-Khatib said yesterday. Hospital officials have previously said that 88 died. Khatib refused to give the breakdown of nationalities but various reports suggested Italians, Turks and Britons are among the foreign dead, whose number is expected to rise further. A previously unknown movement calling itself the Unity and Jihad Group in Egypt said it perpetrated the attacks âin revenge for our brothers in Iraq and Afghanistan... and in response to the war against terrorâ. âIt was also out of loyalty to the leaders of the Mujahedin within the Al Qaeda network, Sheikh Osama bin Laden and Sheikh Ayman al-Zawahiri, may God preserve them,â said the statement, whose authenticity could not be verified. The group said it also carried out the October bombings. It named five âmartyrsâ it said died in the Sharm attacks. The names differed from those given by another group that claimed responsibility for the bombings on Monday, Mujahedeen Egypt. The first group to claim responsibility for the attacks, the deadliest in Egypt, was a movement calling itself the Al Qaeda Organisation in the Levant and Egypt. | |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |