An explosion rocked a tourist bus near Egypt‘s Giza Pyramids wounding 17 people, according to officials.
The wounded included South African tourists and Egyptians, officials said on Sunday. There were no reports of deaths.
Pictures on social media showed at least one person covered in blood and a bus with some of its windows blown out or shattered.
The bomb went off on a road near the Grand Egyptian Museum, which is still under construction and not open to tourists.
Sunday’s blast came as Egypt’s vital tourism industry showed signs of recovery after years in the doldrums because of the political turmoil and violence that followed a 2011 uprising that toppled former leader Hosni Mubarak.
It was the second such incident involving foreign tourists near the famed pyramids in less than six months.
In December, three Vietnamese tourists and an Egyptian guide were killed when a roadside bomb hit a tour bus less than four kilometres from the Giza landmarks.
Timothy Kaldas, a political analyst and non-resident fellow at US-based The Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy, said it was “too early to know” who was responsible for Sunday’s blast.
“The last time we had an attack on a tourist bus that had been leaving the pyramids in December no one ended up claiming responsibility,” Kaldas told Al Jazeera.
He added that the Egyptian government has traditionally responded forcefully to such incidents.
“Historically these sorts of attacks have been followed by announcements of raids on different militant groups outposts,” he said.
SOURCE:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
