Gunmen killed 15 soldiers at a checkpoint in western Egypt on Saturday, security officials said, in one of their biggest assaults since president Mohammed Mursi’s ouster last year, Agence France-Presse reported.

The attack took place in al-Farara region located 627 kilometers from Cairo, near Libya.

Libyan officials have long said that they know about security problems along the border, and thay cooperate with Egyptian authorities.

A few days before he was elected Egypt’s president in May, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi discreetly visited tribesmen living along the border with Libya.

Al Arabiya