Gunmen kidnap two American tourists in Egypt's Sinai peninsula Two female tourists and their Egyptian tour guide Friday were intercepted by gunmen and kidnapped in the Sinai peninsula, the Associated Press reports. St. Catherine's Monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai in Egypt. (Hussein Talal - AP) Maj. Gen. Mohammed Naguib, the head of south Sinai security, told the wire service that the gunmen had been driving a pickup truck and a sedan. He said the kidnappers sped away into the mountains with the women and their tour guide after snatching them from their minivan. A helicopter search-and-rescue mission is underway, Naguib said. An Egyptian Ministry of the Interior spokesman told CNN that the kidnappers "want certain detainees released and retried." The tourists were near St. Catherine's Monastery when the kidnapping occurred, on the start of a return trip to the Red Sea resort town of Sharm-el-Sheikh, according to the state newspaper Al-Ahram. St. Catherine's on a map. It is located almost 250 miles from Cairo. Google Maps Three other people who were in the minivan were left behind, according to Naguib. It is unclear what nationalities they were. Also in Sinai, a group of 25 Chinese workers were kidnapped by Bedouin tribesmen last month and then freed a day later, the BBC reported. The tribesmen had kidnapped the workers to demand the release of detainees held over bombings in the peninsula between 2004 and 2006, according to ABC News. Egyptian protesters blame deteriorating security and rising crime in the country on the military council that assumed power after the ouster of longtime rule Hosni Mubarak almost a year ago. Last week, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood's son Sam, who is working for a pro-democracy group in Egypt, was barred from leaving the country, along with at least five other Americans.