CAIRO -- The Islamic Group or el-Gamaa el-Islamiya, once a militant group in Egypt that renounced violence by mid-1990s, has admitted it attempted to assassinate former president Hosni Mubarak 12 times, a leading figure of the group said on Tuesday. "We had 12 failed attempts on the life of Mubarak. All the bids were led by elements from the Islamic Group," said Ali el-Sherif, a key figure of the group in Egypt. He added that an assassination bid on Mubarak in Addis Ababa in 1995 had been planned by his group in Yemen and was orchestrated by key militant Sherif Abdel Rahman. He said that the decision to assassinate Mubarak was taken due to practices by police in his era against the detained members of the Islamic Group and the arrest of their wives.
