BREAKING: Suicide Bomber Attacks Egypt's Luxor Temple Tourist Site [Photos]

Number of casualties at Karnak temple unclear after latest suicide bombing in Egypt to target a site popular with foreign and domestic tourists.

According to The Telegraph, a suicide bomber and two other suspected Islamist terrorists have attacked an ancient Egyptian temple near Luxor popular with tourists, security sources and witnesses said.

The bomber attacked the Karnak temple in the southern Egyptian city on Wednesday morning. According to initial reports, he blew himself up in the parking lot of the tourist site.

Two other men attempting to storm a barricade leading to the Karnak temple site were killed in a shoot out with police.

Within a few hours of the first attack, the Egyptian tourism ministry told the Telegraph there had been another terrorist incident in the Pyramids area.

No more details were provided about the second attack.

The body of a suicide bomber at the scene of the suicide attack in Luxor, Egypt (Photo: Reuters)

The extent of the casualties were not immediately clear. A health ministry spokesman said four Egyptians were wounded. Security sources said casualties included bazaar shop owners and two policemen.

Egypt's state news reported that no tourists were injured, citing an anonymous "senior security source". Health ministry officials said there were only a handful of tourists and Egyptians inside the temple at the time of the late morning attack.

Police near the scene of the suicide attack in Luxor, Egypt (Photo: Reuters)

However, Egypt's interior minister claimed that the purported bomber had only been wounded, in what he described as a "foiled terrorist attack".

"Security forces in Luxor foiled a terrorist operation.. two terrorists killed and a third was wounded," the police said in a statement.

The city is frequented by millions of foreign and Egyptian tourists every year.

The attack was the first to target world-famous attractions in Luxor since November 1997, when Islamic militants opened fire on tourists at the city's 3,400-year-old Hatshepsut Temple on the west bank of the Nile, killing 58.

No group immediately claimed responsibility but Islamist militants bent on toppling the Cairo government have killed hundreds of police and soldiers in the past, usually at checkpoints and barracks or police stations.

Gunmen on a motorcycle shot dead two members of Egypt's tourism and antiquities police force on a road near the Giza pyramids last week.