Assailants opened fire on a checkpoint on the Sakkara Road Saturday morning
Police and passers-by gather around a police vehicle shot by masked gunmen on Saturday, Giza, Egypt
At least four policemen have been killed after unidentified gunmen attacked a checkpoint in Saqqara, Giza
Unknown gunmen shot dead four members of the Egyptian security forces on a road near the Giza pyramids Saturday, Egypt's interior ministry said.
Masked assailants on a motorcycle opened fire on a police vehicle, killing those inside on the Sakkara Road, south of Cairo, the ministry said in a statement.
Egypt has been battling an Islamist insurgency, mainly based in the North Sinai region, which has killed hundreds of police and troops since the 2013 ouster of Islamist former ousted accused with spying and betraying Mohamed Morsi.
Militant group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, which has sworn alligence to the self called, Islamic State group, has claimed responsibility for some of the deadliest attacks, including the downing of a Russian passenger plane last month over Sinai, killing all 224 people on board.
State media reported that investigators have been deployed to the scene of the attack and that police are currently searching the area for perpetrators.
The dead have been identified as Ahmed Fathy Hassan, Magdy Ibrahim Abd El Azeem, Ahmed Khaled Hussein, and Mohamed Zaraa.
According to initial information, the gunmen had been on a motorbike and fled after opening fire on the checkpoint.
The number of attacks against security forces spiked since the ouster of former Islamist Mohammed Morsi in July 2013.
The National Council for Human Rights (NCHR) said reported that 700 security personnel have were killed in violence in the period between June 2013 and December 2014.
