Mubarak: Egypt to quash Islamic militant groups

Egypt’s president said on Sunday his security forces would quash Islamist groups threatening stability in Egypt and the region, highlighting worries about al Qaeda building up strength in places such as Yemen.

President Hosni Mubarak also defended building a barrier on the Gaza border, saying it would stop militants crossing.

“We live in a difficult region and a world fraught with tension … witnessing an expansion of instability across the world from Afghanistan to Pakistan and in Iran and Iraq and Yemen and Somalia and Sudan,” Mubarak said in a speech.

Egyptian prosecutors charged 26 men in 2009 of links to Lebanon’s Hezbollah and of planning attacks in Egypt. Reuters