Gunmen kill 3 policemen north of Cairo

CAIRO (AP):

Gunmen killed three policemen at a security checkpoint north of Cairo yesterday, the Interior Ministry said as suspected Islamic militants waging an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula increasingly spread their campaign to mainland Egypt.

Egyptian security forces have been battling a full-fledged insurgency by the militants, including several al-Qaida-linked groups, in the volatile northern part of Sinai since shortly after the July ouster of Mohammed Morsi, an Islamist who became Egypt's first freely elected president in June last year.

The militants' campaign has been mostly confined to the troubled peninsula, which is separated from the mainland by the Suez Canal, but attacks outside Sinai have grown in frequency in recent weeks.