UPDATE 1-Four police, 3 civilians killed in bomb attack in North Sinai -ministry

Seven people including four police personnel were killed on Tuesday when a suicide bomber targeted police near a market in the North Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid, Egypt's interior ministry said in a statement.

The attacker was around 15 years old, the ministry said, and a six-year-old was among the dead. Twenty-six other people were wounded and have been transferred to hospital, it said. The attack happened when security forces were conducting a sweep near the market, the statement said.

The head of investigations in the town and his assistant were among those killed, three security sources said. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack and said 15 people were killed or wounded. It identified the attacker as Abu Hagar al-Masry and said he had detonated an explosive vest when he was near a police foot patrol.

Egypt is battling an Islamist militant insurgency that has carried out attacks mainly in the remote Sinai Peninsula, where the military has been conducting a major security operation since February 2018. (Reporting by Ahmed Mohamed Hassan and Youssri Mohamed; Writing by Yousef Saba; Editing by Catherine Evans)

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