UN Secretary-General Ban Ki- moon on Monday condemned a deadly ambush in Egypt's North Sinai, in which militants killed 25 policemen in the deadliest attack of its kind in years, Xinhua reported.
"The Secretary-General strongly condemns the latest ambush in the Sinai on two mini-buses which killed 25 Egyptian police officers," said a statement issued here by Ban's spokesperson.
The UN chief expressed the hope that "the perpetrators will be swiftly identified and brought to justice," the statement said.
The militants ambushed the two buses on Monday when they were carrying recruits from their base in North Sinai's Rafah city to their homes to spend vacation, which killed at least 25 policemen and wounded three others.
Official news agency MENA said that the militants fired the two buses with RPGs (rocket-propelled grenade). The unknown gunmen forced the policemen to leave the bus and put them in lines, and then started shooting excessively.
Meanwhile, the UN chief "is deeply disturbed by the reported deaths, in a separate incident, of 36 prisoners in police custody Sunday night as they were being transferred from one facility to another," according to the statement.
Ban called for a full investigation to this incident and conveyed his condolences to the families of the victims, it said.
A total of 36 members of the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Egypt's ousted President Mohamed Morsi hails, died in a riot when they were being transferred to a jail on Sunday.