Egyptian interior minister's convoy bombed

Powerful bomb blast that injured at least 20 people has raised fears of a bloody insurgency. Alice Fordham reports from Cairo

Egyptian security personnel gather at the scene of a bomb attack targeting the convoy of Egypt's interior minister Mohammed Ibrahim, in Nasr City, Cairo.

CAIRO // A convoy carrying Egypt's interior minister was the target of a powerful bomb blast that injured at least 20 people yesterday, tearing off shopfronts and raising fears of a bloody insurgency.

Mohammed Ibrahim was unhurt in the attack in Nasr City but four security officials travelling with the convoy were wounded.

Six civilians including a seven-year-old boy whose leg was blown off were among those wounded, the interior ministry said. State media reported more than 20 were injured.

The UAE Foreign Ministry was quick to condemn the attack, stressing that the nation stood alongside Egypt in confronting terrorism and sympathising with the victims of the attack.

Mr Ibrahim appeared on state TV shortly after the bombing, which he described as cowardly.

The interim cabinet vowed to hit terrorism with an "iron hand".

"The cabinet insists that this criminal act will not prevent the government from confronting terrorism with force and determination," it said.

After a lull in violent tensions between Islamist supporters of the ousted president Mohammed Morsi and the security forces, the bomb ignited fears that significant violence could take hold in previously safe places in Egypt.

The interior ministry suggested it could have been a suicide attack. There was no large crater at the scene as is usual in car bomb attacks, and the ministry said there were body parts at the scene.

But a large "explosive container" may also have been placed in a car and detonated remotely, it said.

At the site of the bombing, five cars were all but destroyed and windscreens were smashed on several more. Debris was blasted at least 20 metres.

Nasr City was the site of a sit-in of Morsi supporters, which was cleared by soldiers and police last month, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of people and sparking violence across the city.

The attack was just a few blocks from Rabaa Al Adawiyya mosque, the focal point of the sit-in.

Mohamed Nagm, 40, who owns a nearby bedding shop, was sitting among mattresses and sheets.

"There will be another bomb," Mr Nagm said. "I think it is not the last one."

Mr Nagm said he thought the deposed president Mr Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood, from whom he draws his support, could be behind the attack, angered by their military removal from power on July 3.

Hazem Abdullah, 32, had just opened his pharmacy shop when the blast shook the neighbourhood about 10.30am local time.

"It was like an earthquake with a loud noise … I thought a plane had come down on us," Mr Abdullah said. "The situation is explosive."

Rushing outside to look and take pictures, he was shocked, and said he had no idea such a thing could happen so close to him.

The fresh violence targeting Mr Ibrahim, who heads the police, comes after a spate of attacks on his stations and officers, including a home-made grenade hurled at a police station in Giza earlier this week. The attacks have been consistently linked to the Brotherhood by officials.

But the Brotherhood denied any involvement in the attack, saying in a statement that the group has eschewed violence throughout its history.

"Mr Mohamed Badie, general guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, said on the stage at Rabaa, "Our peacefulness is more powerful than their bullets," said the statement.

Egypt struggled with an insurgency throughout the 1990s and violence has flared in recent weeks in places that the central government has long struggled to control, including the Sinai.

In the biggest attack so far, 25 policemen were killed in one attack in the Sinai last month, state media reported.

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