Three police officers were killed on Tuesday night by unknown gunmen. Lieutenant Ahmed Hussein Fahmy, Sergeant Mohamed Abdel Qader and Corporal Eid Abdel Hafiz were targeted by unidentified assailants in a car while securing the road between Suez and Ismailia in the area of Al-Samakin, according to the Ministry of Interior. A statement from the ministry said that security forces had intensified efforts to identify and apprehend the perpetrators. The attack came shortly after a traffic police officer was killed in Port Said. Major Fady Awad was attacked by unidentified gunmen on a motorcycle, according to the ministry, which added that the assailants had not yet been caught by security forces. Interim Prime Minister Hazem El-Beblawi strongly condemned the attacks and blamed the Muslim Brotherhood for the wave of attacks on security personnel. The prime minister accused the group of "spreading terror and fear in the Egyptian street" and attacking the police and army. El-Beblawi also pointed out that the Muslim Brotherhood had been outlawed, but said that it "continued to sabotage, demolish, and terrorise innocent people in order to destroy society and bring down the state". The Muslim Brotherhood has repeatedly denied responsibility for attacks on security personnel and condemned the rise in violence in official statements. In December, a bomb was detonated at the Daqahleya Security Directorate in Mansoura, killing 16. Despite the Brotherhood's condemnation of the attack, the cabinet designated the group as a terrorist organisation on 25 December. On 30 January the interior ministry said that 432 of its personnel had been killed since 25 January 2011. At the time it also announced that 190 policemen had been killed since 14 August, the day of the violent dispersals of pro-Mohamed Morsi sit-ins at Rabaa Al-Adaweya and Nahda Square.
