CAIRO: Two Italian tourists died and 25 others were injured in a bus crash Wednesday on Egypt's northern coast near the World War II battlefield of El Alamein, Egypt's state-owned Middle East News Agency (Mena) reported. The tour bus overturned because of heavy rains along the country's main coastal highway linking the Mediterranean city of Alexandria with neighboring Libya, Mena added. The driver of the bus was also among those injured in the accident and police have begun an inquiry, the agency said. In Rome the foreign ministry said the two tourists killed were female, but that only 15 were injured, one of them seriously. According to the ministry, there were 29 Italians aboard the bus. El Alamein is the site of a major battle in 1942 between the German and Italian armies on one side and the British on the other, and is widely regarded as a turning point in the battle for control of North Africa. It is regularly visited by tourists from those nations. A combination of bad roads and reckless driving make Egypt's highways particularly accident-prone. -AP
