Al-Arish - Two Canadian women peacekeepers from the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) were wounded in a bomb blast yesterday in Egypt's Sinai peninsula that officials described as a terrorist attack.
"Terrorists planted two gas canisters on the road and linked them to an electrical wire. They hid in nearby apricot groves and blew them up," North Sinai Governor Ahmed Abdel Hamid told reporters.
Hamid said only one of the bombs exploded and that the other was being examined by ordnance experts, adding that two women Canadian peacekeepers from the MFO were lightly wounded. He added that several Bedouin in the area had been arrested. A senior Egyptian security official confirmed the circumstances of the attack.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. The Multinational Force and Observers is an independent peacekeeping force not related to the United Nations, created as a result of the 1979 Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty and funded mainly by the two neighbors and the United States.
The MFO reported a blast at around 9:00 am (0600 GMT) about one kilometer (half a mile) west of the military airport of Al-Gurah, in the east of the Sinai Peninsula.
But it could not immediately confirm the identity of the wounded, nor could the Canadian authorities.
"According to preliminary investigations, a crude bomb was used in the explosion, something similar to what had been used during Al Azhar and Tahrir attacks last April," said an Interior Ministry official who asked not to be identified.
Egypt's Prosecutor General Maher Abdel Wahed told Arab News it was too early to link the attacks to the deployment of the Egyptian forces in Rafah. "We should not jump to conclusions so quickly and link it to the withdrawal in Gaza," he said without elaborating.
Egyptian security sources had initially said that the explosion may have been caused by a land mine left over from one of the Egypt's wars with Israel in the Sinai.
The approximately 2,000-strong international military force was set up in 1982. It includes troops from 11 different countries, including a large US contingent, and is based in two camps in the Sinai. When Gaza's 21 Jewish settlements are evacuated and Israeli troops have fully pulled out of the Strip, Palestinian forces will take over security responsibility for the flashpoint territory. - With input from agencies
By Summer Said
© Arab News 2005
