The attack targeted a National Guard patrol in Sousse, a seaside resort in the east of the country. Another member of the Law Enforcement Forces was wounded.
A member of the National Guard (the equivalent of the gendarmerie) was killed in a “terrorist” attack on the morning of Sunday, September 6 in Sousse, a seaside resort in eastern Tunisia, and three “assailants” were later shot dead, the National Guard told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
“A patrol of two National Guard officers was the victim of a knife attack in Sousse. One of them fell as a martyr and the other, wounded, is hospitalized,” said Houcem Eddine Jebabli, its spokesman. Following this attack, security forces pursued the men who had stolen the patrol car and seized the victims’ pistols.
“In an exchange of fire, three terrorists were killed,” Jebabli told AFP. The attack and the pursuit of the attackers took place in Akouda, in the tourist area El Kantaoui, said the same source. According to the latter, the car and weapons were recovered by law enforcement.
The Ministry of the Interior stated in a statement published on the Internet that “the three assailants” had “hit” the two National Guard officers with their own car, but did not mention that they had stabbed them. “The technical police need to be able to [identify] who is behind [the attackers] and whether they did it individually or on behalf of an organization,” added Tunisian President Kaïs Saïed, who visited the scene of the attack.
Previous attack on law enforcement officials
Each attack brings the country back to the memory of the series of suicide bombings it suffered after the “Jasmine Revolution” in 2011. The city of Sousse, in particular, had already been the scene of a jihadist attack in 2015.
The last such attack dates back to March 6. A policeman was killed and five others wounded, as well as a civilian, in a double suicide attack against the forces of law and order protecting the U.S. Embassy in Tunis. After the fall of the dictatorship in 2011, Tunisia faced a rise in the jihadist movement, responsible for the deaths of dozens of soldiers and policemen, but also many civilians and fifty-nine foreign tourists, including forty in Sousse in 2015.
Nevertheless, the security situation has clearly improved over the past three years. However, attacks against the security forces are still taking place, particularly in the mountainous areas bordering Algeria, and occasionally in Tunis. At the end of June 2019, a double suicide attack claimed by the Islamic State Group (EI) targeted police officers in the center of Tunis and in front of a barracks, and cost the life of a policeman.
