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Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 23 - 29 November 2000 Issue No.509 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 23 - 29 November 2000 Issue No.509
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Focus Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Daylight robbery
By Jailan Halawi
Bank robberies do not occur frequently in Egypt. However, on Tuesday morning there was a very big one.
One of the victims of the bank shooting; the exterior of the National Bank of Egypt cordoned off by police after the robbery
Five masked gunmen attacked two banks in the town of Al-Maragha, in the southern governorate of Sohag. By the time they were finished, 10 people were dead and 11 injured. The robbers got away with LE600,000 -- less than the figure of LE1.3 million that was initially reported.
The drama began at 9.30am, when the assailants drove to the local branch of Banque Misr in a pick-up truck with Assiut registration plates. They opened fire and killed a police guard. Bank employees acted speedily by closing the bank's main entrance, action which prevented the attackers from getting in.
The armed group moved on to the nearby branch of the National Bank of Egypt and once again engaged in an exchange of fire with its police guards. This time they managed to enter the bank, in the process killing and wounding more bystanders, police guards and employees. Bystanders crowding a local market in front of the bank panicked and took cover.
The armed raiders got away with three sacks-full of cash and fled the scene in their pick-up truck, heading north towards Assiut. As they fled, they fired in the air with automatic rifles.
According to Interior Ministry sources, amongst those killed was one of the assailants.
The last similar bank robbery took place in 1994 at the Agricultural Development Bank in Ayyat, Giza. On that occasion assailants got away with LE500,000. At the time, the underground militant group Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiya admitted to carrying it out.
There are a number of similarities between Tuesday's and the 1994 robberies. Automatic weapons were used in both attacks, and the robbers managed to escape after exchanging fire with police. This has led some foreign news agencies to speculate that Islamist militants might have carried out the latest attack. However, Montasser El-Zayyat, a lawyer for the Gama'a, has denied this.
The Gama'a robbed a number of banks and jewellers in southern Egypt between 1992 and 1997, but the region has been largely peaceful since a 1998 police crackdown following a massacre of 58 tourists and four Egyptians in Luxor the previous year.
A Gama'a military commander, Alaa Abdel-Razeq Attiya, was killed by security forces in Aswan on 18 October, triggering threats of revenge from an expatriate leader.
El-Zayyat, though, said that he has received a message from the group's expatriate leaders confirming that they are still totally committed to the unilateral cease-fire first declared in 1997 and put into effect in 1998.
Following Tuesday's robbery, police barricades went up on the roads branching out from Al-Maragha to nearby hills where the assailants are believed to have taken refuge.
As the assailants fled the scene, their truck stalled. They abandoned it and commandeered another car, forcing the driver to transport them. The abandoned car, previously stolen, was bullet-ridden, and a number of spent bullets were later discovered inside it.
Immediately after the attack, shops and schools closed down. The local market was abandoned, except for policemen and local officials who arrived at the scene to consult with investigators.
Police cordoned off the scene to prevent any tampering with evidence until forensic experts and investigators had finished their work.
Meanwhile, investigations continue to determine the identity of the killed assailant by checking the criminal records of armed robbers.
Preliminary evidence indicates that a police officer who rushed to the scene was able to shoot and injure one of the assailants as he fled with a sack of money.
There were conflicting reports about how the killed assailant was gunned down. According to one report, he was shot and injured by police and then killed by an accomplice to prevent his capture.
All evidence points to the fact that the assailants forced the driver of the second car to help them flee from Al-Maragha to the highway leading to Assiut.
This raised the possibility that the attackers might be linked to a group that is currently under investigation for similar robberies of banks and jewellery shops in the nearby towns of Tema and Tahta between 1995 and 1997. The attackers are believed to be hiding in the surrounding hills or fields, which are being combed by police.
Twelve-year-old Alaa Mahfouz Haridi, who was injured in the crossfire, was able to describe the assailants. Haridi said they were aged between 25 and 35. One of them was dark-skinned and of medium height and wearing a red shirt and denim trousers. He was brandishing an automatic rifle and shouting hysterically.
Related stories:
Militant arms to stay down 29 June - 5 July 2000
Light at the end of the tunnel? 1 - 7 April 1999
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