The Northern Giza Prosecution has ordered the 15-day detention of an Egypt Telecom company employee pending his trial. The suspect has been accused of joining an illegal militant group, state media reported. Other defendants in the case were accused and ordered to be detained by the prosecution. State media reported that all the accused are employees of the same company. The defendants face charges for adopting extremist ideologies and belonging to the Islamic State (IS). According to the investigations, the defendants had plans to attack Coptic Christians and their houses of worship. It also revealed that the they were trying to travel to Syria. This follows the 26 May attack on a bus carrying a group of Coptic Christians, where the report stated that eight unidentified gunmen used three four-wheel-drive vehicles and opened fire on the bus, killing 30 of them. The bus was on its way to Saint Samuel Monastery in El Adwa city, in the west of Minya governorate. At least 23 other people were injured. The representative of the Ministry of Health said that many of the victims were children. The bus attack came only a month after the Palm Sunday terrorist attacks on two churches killing over 40 Coptic Christians. Last April, the Egyptian cabinet approved a three-month state of emergency declaration given by President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi.
