Tunisia: Police and three militants killed after ‘terrorist’ attack

Security officials in Tunisia say a police officer was killed and another injured in a knife attack in the coastal town of Susa.

Three assailants were shot dead after the incident, which is described as a terrorist attack.

The latest incident occurs two days after the inauguration of a new government.

The suspected militants crashed their vehicle into a National Guard checkpoint at a junction near the city’s port.

“A patrol of two officers from the National Guard was attacked with a knife in the center of Susa,” said National Guard spokesman Houcem Eddine Jebabli, according to the AFP news agency.

“One died a martyr and the other was wounded and is hospitalized,” he said.

“This was a terrorist attack.”

The cutlers stole weapons and a police vehicle during the attack before fleeing, Jebabli said. Security forces chased them through the tourist areas of El Kantaoui.

“Three terrorists were killed in a shootout,” he said, adding that two weapons and the car were recovered.

It is not clear if the attackers were linked to any particular extremist group, but the broader threat in Tunisia in recent years has been the dispersal of sleeper cells made up of jihadists who returned from Syria, Libya and Iraq, says Rana Jawad of the BBC in Tunisia.

Thirty-eight people were killed when a gunman opened fire on tourists staying at El Kantaoui in June 2015. Thirty of the dead were British tourists staying at the Hotel Rui Imperial Marhaba.

The Islamic State (IS) said it was behind the attack by Tunisian student Seifeddine Rezgui.

The situation in Tunisia has improved a lot since then, although there is a state of emergency.

This week, the Tunisian parliament approved a new government consisting of Prime Minister-designate Hichem Mechichi.

Mr. Mechichi appointed technocrats to his government instead of members of political parties as had been the case in the past.