CAIRO, Jan 14 (Aswat Masriya) – Security forces killed early Wednesday seven "terrorists" in North Sinai, including five who are complicit in the abduction and murder of an officer, the armed forces spokesman said.

Unidentified gunmen kidnapped on Sunday police officer Ayman al-Desouki, who worked at the Rafah border-crossing. His dead body was found two days later, after sustaining two gunshots to the head, according to a statment by the prosecutor general's office.

Armed forces Spokesman Mohamed Samir accused "terrorist elements" of killing the officer, in a statement released on Tuesday.

The kidnapped officer was heading to work in a taxi on the Rafah-Sheikh Zuweid International Road, when militants abducted him, the prosecution genereal said.

Security forces also destroyed 24 "terrorist meeting points" during their Wednesday raids, Samir said.

Militants have stepped up attacks targeting security forces in Egypt, particularly in the Sinai Peninsula, since the army's ouster of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in July 2013, which followed mass protests against his rule.

At least 30 military personnel were killed in a suicide blast which targeted a security checkpoint in Sinai's Sheikh Zuweid on October 24, 2014, in the worst militant attack since Mursi's ouster. 

Egypt’s most active militant group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, which changed its name to Sinai Province since pledging allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State fighters in Iraq and Syria, claimed responsibility for the attack in a video it allegedly released three weeks later.

Militants in North Sinai have recently engaged in the kidnap and execution of Sinai residents whom they accuse of cooperation with security apparatuses.

Residents of North Sinai's Sheikh Zuweid found on Saturday the bodies of two decapitated youths, police sources said.

Tribal sources said the deceased young men were kidnapped two weeks ago by "unidentified gunmen under the pretext of cooperating with security apparatuses."

Police sources said on Saturday that there are currently seven young men kidnapped by the militant group, also for cooperating with security forces.