CAIRO, 1 March 2004 — Heavily armed police were again locked in gunbattles yesterday with criminals they have been trying to arrest since imposing a siege on a southern Egyptian village late last week, police said.
With gunfire echoing in the background, a resident of Nekheila, Yassin Hassan, told AFP by telephone that many people had been killed in days of violence, but police denied anyone had died.
Police told AFP that gunbattles continued yesterday after they seized the western portion of the Nile village about 400 kilometers south of Cairo on Saturday. They added that the fugitives had set fire to 13 homes in a bid to block the police advance.
