Sepcial Report: Blast rocks Egypt's Red Sea resort

    DAHAB, Egypt, April 25 (Xinhua) -- Residents and tourists in the Egyptian Sinai resort of Dahab on Tuesday appeared unfazed by three explosions which killed at least 23 people and injured scores of others on Monday evening.

    Egyptian shopkeepers were quietly cleaning debris in their destroyed stores, with anger and frustration clearly under control, while foreign diving instructors, though scared, appeared not to over read into the consequences of the blasts.

    "I was really scared, but not so much worried about my safety here," said a young Swedish diving instructor near a restaurant where one of the explosions took place.

    He went on to joke about his experiences of bombings in Egypt. "I somewhat got used to such things," he said.

    "I was in Taba in 2004 and I happened to be in Sharm el-Sheikh last year," he added, referring to two other rounds of bomb attacks in other Sinai resorts which killed more than 100 people since October 2004.

    "You can call me an explosion-chaser," he said with a wink. Peter Johnson, an Australian who has been living in Dahab for over three years as a diving instructor, also appeared unnerved.

    "I had first thought it was a big bang on a door, but then people told me it was a bomb," he said in a calm voice.

    "I'm not really worried. I believe in God," he said, and then went on to look for his friends whom he feared might have been injured in the attacks.

    Hundreds of foreign tourists, mostly westerners, were seen on Tuesday afternoon walking around near the area where the explosions occurred.

    If not for the broken windows and blood stains, Dahab looked just like any other serene Egyptian Red Sea resorts with clear sky and blue sea.

    On Tuesday morning, a dozen or so local Egyptian residents staged a clamorous but peaceful demonstration near the blast scene, demanding "an end to terrorist attacks."

    Tourism is one of Egypt's key industries, which generated more than 7 billion U.S dollars in 2005 and employs about 10 percent of the country's workforce.

    The Dahab bombings were the third such attack in Sinai since October 2004.

    On Oct. 7, 2004, a Hilton hotel in the Sinai resort of Taba, on Egypt's border with Israel, and two beaches further south were attacked by bombs, in which 34 people were killed.

    On July 23, 2005, Sharm el-Sheikh, another famed Red Sea resort, was rocked by three bomb explosions, leaving at least 60 people dead and more than 200 others wounded. Enditem