Egypt: 3 policemen killed in blast

Egypt’s state-run news agency says three police conscripts have been killed in a rocket-propelled grenade attack in the Sinai Peninsula.

News agency MENA reported that the slain men came under attack late Thursday while they were driving along a northern Sinai highway.

MENA says two were killed instantly, and a third died of his wounds in an el-Arish hospital.

A series of attacks, assassinations and suicide bombings has hit Egypt over the past year following the military ouster of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

An al-Qaeda-inspired group known as Ansar Beit al-Maqdis has claimed responsibility for most of the major attacks, which mainly target police and the army. No group has yet claimed Thursday’s attack.