NEWS AND VIEWS

"An explosion has ripped through a major shopping bazaar in an area of Cairo popular with tourists, killing two and injuring several more.

The blast, close to Cairo's al-Azhar mosque, killed two, including one French national and injured eight other people, police said.

The explosion, at about 1700 (1500 GMT), may have been caused by a bomb thrown from a motorbike, police said.

The al-Azhar mosque is a major seat of Islamic learning in Cairo.

A number of busy shopping bazaars are crammed into the narrow streets around al-Azhar, in Cairo's ancient Muslim quarter.

Unrecognisable body

The blast went off on al-Moski Street, a narrow street of tourist shops and clothes sellers - often crammed with foreigners and Egyptian shoppers, carts and peddlers - near the main bazaar of Khan al-Khalili.

Rabab Rifaat, a woman shopping nearby, told the Associated Press news agency she heard a loud 'boom', and saw a decapitated head flying through the air.

A Frenchman was reported to have died at hospital from his injuries, while a woman's unrecognisable body was also recovered from the scene, the Reuters news agency reported.

Islamic militants in Egypt have staged attacks on tourist attractions in the past."

# posted by R @ 12:08 PM