Two policemen were killed in Alexandria, Egypt, on Saturday by a bomb that went off as a convoy containing the city’s security chief passed by, wrote theguardian.

Four other police officers and one civilian were wounded by the same bomb, the interior ministry said.

Gen Mostafa al-Nimr survived the explosion and was seen on local TV in good condition while inspecting the area of the blast shortly after it took place.

The explosion occurred in the vicinity of a police station in the city’s central Roshdi district.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bomb.

The attack came just days before Egypt’s presidential election, in which Abdel Fatah al-Sisi is virtually certain to be re-elected.

It also came during a massive security operation involving land, sea and air forces in areas covering north and central Sinai and parts of Egypt’s Nile delta and the Western Desert, along the porous border with Libya.

The interior ministry said the explosive device had been placed under a car and it had detonated as the convoy passed. It was reported that the public prosecutor has ordered an investigation.

Egypt has for years been struggling to contain an Islamic insurgency spearheaded by a local affiliate of Islamic State in the turbulent Sinai region but attacks on the mainland have also occurred.

The country has been under a state of emergency since April 2017, when suicide bombers struck two Coptic Christian churches in Alexandria and Tanta on Palm Sunday in an attack claimed later by Isis.