Egypt Blasts Kill at Least 30

At least 30 people have been killed and more than 100 wounded after three explosions rocked the Egyptian resort city of Dahab tonight.

Residents said they saw body parts and debris in the street outside a restaurant and witnesses said smoke billowed up from the tourist bazaar in Dahab.

The blasts happened around 7.15pm local time (1715 GMT) and hit the Nelson restaurant, Aladdin cafe and Ghazala supermarket.

A cafe worker near the scene of one explosion said: "We saw many dead people. People were screaming. People were being taken to hospital. There's police everywhere."

The Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, tonight described the Dahab explosions as a "terrorist act".

"The president stressed the need to ... track down those responsible for this wicked terrorist act, so that they pay the penalty by force of law," the Egyptia state news agency Mena said.

An official with the local ambulance service said many of the dead appeared to be foreigners.

Police officials said more than 20 ambulances and police cars were rushed to the el-Masbat section of the city.

Terrorist attacks have killed nearly 100 people at tourist resorts in the Sinai peninsula in the past two years.

Bombings in the resorts of Taba and Ras Shitan, near the Israeli border, killed 34 people in October 2004. Suicide attackers in July 2005 in the resort of Sharm el-Sheik killed at least 64 people.

Groups claiming links to al-Qaida took responsibility for those attacks, and Egyptian authorities say new Islamic militant groups have arisen in the peninsula - but they are still trying to determine if they have any real connection to al-Qaida or other international terrorist groups.