Security sources in the coastal city of Alexandria on Thursday confirmed the Egyptian Coast Guard has shot dead two Syrian refugees trying to leave illegally aboard a boat headed to Italy. Coast Guardsmen killed a man and a woman, wounding a second man, all of them Syrian, while firing into the air in order to intercept their boat, which was carrying 50 Syrians, 122 Palestinians, two Egyptians, one Moroccan and eight Egyptian crew members, a security communique said.
Over the past month, Egypt has witnessed a rapid increase in illegal emigration attempts by Syrian and Palestinian residents due to a rise in anti-foreigner sentiment after the army ousted Muslim Brotherhood President Mohamed Morsi, with some media accusing them of being Brotherhood supporters and participating in pro-Morsi sit-ins that were dispersed in a bloody August military crackdown.
Another element pushing people to emigrate illegally is an increase in restrictive visa policies, Al Ahram said. Many attempt to travel from Alexandria to Italy - as documented in the almost daily chronicles of desperate landings and rescues off the coast of Sicily - and from there to the rest of Europe.
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