CAIRO — Gunmen attacked a security checkpoint in a city north of Cairo on Monday and killed three policemen, the Interior Ministry said, the latest sign that Islamic militants who are waging an insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula may be spreading their campaign to mainland Egypt. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack in the city of Mansoura, but such attacks are typical for the militants opposed to Egypt's military-backed government. The Egyptian military and police have been battling a full-fledged insurgency by the militants — including several Al-Qaeda-linked groups — in the volatile northern part of Sinai since shortly after the July ouster of Mohammed Morsi. The militants' campaign has been mostly confined to the troubled peninsula, which is separated from the mainland by the Suez Canal, but attacks outside Sinai have grown in frequency in recent weeks. The attacks have included an assassination attempt on the interior minister last month, the car bombing of the military intelligence building in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia earlier this month and the killing of four Coptic Christians and a Muslim, outside a Cairo church last week. – AP
