Two women in their 20s opened fire on a tour bus in a historic district of the Egyptian capital Saturday, then killed themselves, the Interior Ministry said. Two other people were injured.
Two hours earlier a man suspected in a tourist bazaar bombing earlier this month - the brother and fiance of the women who shot up the bus - leapt from an overpass during a police chase and set off a bomb he was carrying. He died and seven people, including four foreigners, were injured in the blast.
Ehab Yousri Yassin was being sought in connection with that attack when he set of the Saturday blast near a five-star hotel frequented by foreigners and behind the Egyptian Museum in downtown Cairo. In the bus shooting, the Interior Ministry identified the two women attackers as Yassin's sister, Negat, and his fiancee, Iman Ibrahim Khamis.
A group calling itself the Abdullah Azzam Brigades claimed responsibility for the attacks in a statement posted on a Web forum used by Islamist group. It said the attacks were in revenge for the deaths of those who carried out the Sinai bombings last year and for the subsequent arrests of thousands of people.
"The crimes you committed against the people of Sinai ... will not pass lightly," the statement said, addressing President Hosni Mubarak. "The time for your removal has come."
