Gunmen attack church in Egypt
October 21, 2013
Three people were shot dead and several others injured on Sunday after gunmen fired on a group outside a Coptic Church in a Cairo suburb, Egypt's Interior Ministry reported.
The masked assailants targeted the group as they emerged from the church in north Cairo's Al-Warak neighborhood after attending a wedding, the ministry announced. It added that an eight-year-old girl was among the dead.
Egyptian Christians, the majority of whom are Copts, have increasingly become the target of attacks since the army ouster of elected Islamist President Mohammed Morsi on July 3.
A particular trigger was a security crackdown on two Islamist protest camps demanding the reinstatement on Morsi in Cairo on August 14, which left hundreds of his supporters dead. Islamists enraged by the crackdown accused Coptic Christians of backing the coup, an allegation fuelled by the Coptic Pope Tawadros II's appearance alongside army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi when he announced on television Morsi's removal from office.
ccp/msh (AFP, Reuters)