CAIRO — A French teenager killed in a bombing at a landmark Cairo bazaar was on a school trip with several dozen classmates, many of whom were wounded, the mayor of her hometown said today.
Sunday night’s explosion from a homemade bomb hit the busy main square of the sprawling Khan el-Khalili market, which was packed with tourists, including the French high school tour group. The 17-year-old girl from a Paris suburb was killed, and at least 24 people were wounded, most of them French students.
The girl, whose name has not been released, was on a trip with 41 other teenage students, said Patrick Balkany, mayor of her hometown, Levallois-Perret, a suburb on Paris’ northwest edge.
The students were nearing the end of their trip when the attack occurred, Balkany told RTL radio today. He said some of the students had serious wounds, and other students suffered psychological shock from the “horror” of the experience.
“We are faced with a dreadful drama,” Balkany said.
France’s prime minister, Francois Fillon, denounced what he called an “odious attack.”
“There are people who want to destabilize Egypt, which is one of the moderate countries in the region,” Fillon told journalists in Paris. “It is an illustration of the violence that we must eradicate.”
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the bombing. Islamic extremists have in the past attacked tourists in an attempt to hurt Egypt’s biggest source of income. Sunday’s attack — the first on tourists in three years — comes as the tourist industry is already suffering under the global financial crisis, which has meant fewer visitors to the country.
The Khan el-Khalili, is a 650-year-old bazaar of narrow, winding alleys. Dotted with old mosques and Islamic monuments and shops, it is one of the top tourist spots in Cairo, often crowded with foreigners coming to shop and hang out in its numerous cafes. In April 2005, a suicide bomber in the market killed himself, two French citizens and an American.
Sunday’s bomb was packed with TNT and explosive black powder, said Egypt’s state-run news agency, MENA. A government statement said it was placed under a bench in a busy square in front of one of Cairo’s most revered shrines, the Hussein mosque. Some security officials, however, said the explosive had been thrown into the square, and it was unclear which version was correct.
Security officials said three people were in custody. Authorities safely detonated a second bomb that was found. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press.
Among the wounded were 19 French youths, a German, three Saudis and an Egyptian, according to a hospital report. Three French teenagers remained in the intensive care unit today. One had a lung injury, another broken legs and the third suffered a ruptured ear drum.
One of the injured Saudis said he and his two friends were heading toward the Hussein mosque when the blast went off behind them.
“The minute we stepped out of the taxi and walked a few steps, an explosion rocked the area,” said Mohammed Behees, a 31-year-old teacher from Riyadh who was injured by shattered glass.
Egypt fought a long war with Islamist militants in the 1990s, culminating in a massacre of more than 50 tourists in Luxor in 1997. The rebels were largely defeated, and there have been few attacks since then in the Nile valley.
But from 2004 to 2006, a string of bombings against resorts in the Sinai Peninsula killed 120 people, including in the Sinai’s main resort of Sharm el-Sheik.
Still, tourism has proven resilient after those attacks, with foreigners still pouring in for Egypt’s resorts and antiquity. Tourism brought in $10.8 billion in fiscal 2007-2008, making it Egypt’s top money earner.
Sunday’s attack as well is likely to have little long-term impact, said officials at tour operator Travco Group and analysts at Cairo-based investment banks EFG-Hermes and Beltone Financial.
More damaging is the world economic meltdown, which is making many in Egypt’s prime European markets decide to stay home rather than travel for vacation. Tourist arrivals are expected to decline by 18 percent in 2009 to roughly 10.5 million visitors, EFG-Hermes said.
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