Blast at Cairo checkpoint wounds 2 police

Two policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded early Monday at a checkpoint in a northeastern Cairo neighbourhood that houses a presidential palace, judicial sources said. The bomb was planted in a bush and went off at dawn in the capital's Al-Amiriya neighbourhood, they said, adding that an investigation was launched to find the perpetrators of the attack. Monday's blast was the second such attack against a checkpoint in Cairo within a week. On November 20, a bomb was thrown at a checkpoint in Cairo's northern area of Abboud. Four policemen, including a major, were wounded. On the same day a car bomb in Egypt's restive Sinai peninsula killed 11 soldiers and wounded another 34. Islamist militants have stepped up an armed campaign against security forces in Sinai, killing dozens of troops and police in near-daily attacks since the ouster of president Mohamed Morsi in July. Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, an Al-Qaeda inspired group based in Sinai, has also staged attacks in Cairo, claiming responsibility for assassinating a senior police officer earlier this month who was involved in an ongoing government crackdown on Islamists. The group also claimed a bomb attack against interim interior minister Mohamed Ibrahim in September.