Cairo: A militant Egyptian man wrapped an explosive belt around his wife’s waist after she threatened to report him to police, a local newspaper said on Saturday.
The woman, wearing the belt, went on foot to a police station near her house in the working-class area of Embaba north of Cairo, and requested help, the privately owned newspaper Al Masry Al Youm reported, quoting a security source.
Police escorted the woman to an uninhabited area where explosives experts defused the belt.
“The belt had highly explosive materials linked to an SIM card to be detonated through a remote controller,” the source said.
The woman, whose name was not disclosed, told investigators that her husband is a member of the now-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood and joined a terrorist group that attacked police and power pylons. The paper did not say if the suspected man had been arrested.
Egypt has seen a wave of attacks since the army’s 2013 overthrow of president Mohammad Mursi, a Brotherhood leader, following enormous street protests against his rule.
Authorities have blamed the violence on the Brotherhood, which denied involvement, saying it pursues peaceful activism.