Tourist Killed in Egypt Attack; Muslim Extremists Suspected

CAIRO — Suspected Muslim extremists opened fire Sunday on a bus carrying four British tourists in southern Egypt, killing one and wounding the others and the Egyptian driver, security officials said.

John Byers of London was the seventh foreign tourist to be killed since extremists began a violent campaign 2 1/2 years ago to overthrow Egypt’s secular government and impose strict Islamic rule.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the militant Gamaa al Islamiya was suspected. The group has been the main force behind the radicals’ campaign and has claimed responsibility for the slaying of a Spanish teen-ager in the same area on Aug. 26.

Sunday’s attack occurred about 10:30 a.m. near the town of Naqada, about 300 miles south of Cairo.

A statement issued by the Interior Ministry said the bus was not traveling along the usual tourist route, and it would have gotten better police protection if security officials had been notified in advance of the trip.

The driver of the bus, Ahmed Abdel-Kader, told police he was slowing down when four gunmen appeared and sprayed the vehicle with automatic-weapons fire. They fled in a waiting car, he said.

Byers, 46, was shot in the right side of the chest, security sources said. His wife, Linda Edwards, was slightly injured.

Abdel-Kader was shot in the shoulder, and Martine Morris, 47, and her husband Michael, 46, were also injured, according to sources at Naqada General Hospital.

The four tourists from London arrived in Egypt last week, the security sources said.

On Oct. 14, Nobel Prize-winning novelist Naguib Mahfouz was stabbed outside his home in Cairo, and militants took responsibility for that attack. The 83-year-old author is in a hospital recovering from knife wounds to the neck.

Two police officers and 15 suspected extremists have died in a government crackdown following the attack on Mahfouz.