No, the blue wire! Man blows self up placing bomb on Egypt train line

Published November 24th, 2014 - 10:54 GMT
Al Bawaba
Al Bawaba

A man killed himself accidentally while laying explosives on a railway in southern Egypt, according to the Egyptian government.
The blast rocked railroad tracks on the Fayoum-Beni Suef line Saturday night in Beni Suef province, around 75 miles south of Cairo.

Police arrived on scene and found the charred body of an unidentified man near the blast site. According to a statement by the Ministry of Interior, inspecting officers concluded he had killed himself in error while laying the explosive. Efforts to identify the body are underway.

Further inspection along the Aswan-Cairo line uncovered three more explosive devices, which bomb experts disarmed.

Train-related attacks have been on the rise in Egypt. A sonic bomb detonated in a Cairo train station on Nov. 13 caused a stampede that injured seven people.

Such militant attacks in Egypt -- including the bombing in a train car earlier this month that killed four people -- have become more frequent since 2013, when President Mohamed Morsi, whose political backing came from the Muslim Brotherhood, was forced from power.

Further north the town of Rafah faces destruction as the Egyptian government demolishes homes in order to create a buffer zone -- mainly to eliminate smuggling tunnels -- between the Gaza Strip and the Sinai peninsula, where in October 33 Egyptian troops were killed in militant attacks.

By Fred Lambert

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