Five police conscripts were killed when militants ambushed their vehicle in Egypt's North Sinai city of Arish on Saturday evening, Al-Ahram Arabic website reported.

The militants released the driver and shot the conscripts dead.

Hundreds of security forces in North Sinai have been killed in similar attacks by Islamic militants since the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

Egyptian security forces also killed hundreds of suspected militants in North Sinai during the same period.