Egypt's interior ministry announced on Wednesday the reclaiming of 421 feddans of state-owned land that had been illegally appropriated by private parties in recent decades, state news agency MENA reported. Authorities reclaimed land in 10 governorates including Cairo, Minya, Aswan, Luxor, Qena and Kafr El-Sheikh. The national committee formed by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi to redeem stolen state land is meeting today to take all necessary measures to reclaim these lands by the end of the month, Ahram Arabic website reported. At a televised conference on Sunday, El-Sisi expressed frustration at delays in the ongoing process of reclaiming state land, urging the interior ministry and the Armed Forces to put an end to such transgressions. In an interview with state-owned newspapers on Wednesday, the president announced that he will hold a conference in two weeks that will include the defence and interior ministers, governors, and the heads of the military and police, who will report on their efforts to reclaim the illegally appropriated land. “Transgressions on the lands of the Egyptian people and the rights of the poor are a threat to Egypt's security,” the president stated, calling on the media to take part in this “battle to reclaim the rights of the state and the people.” Last December, the committee announced that it had restored 80,000 feddans of land illegally acquired at the expense of the state. The committee is headed by Egypt's former prime minister Ibrahim Mahlab and includes the minister of local development, the president's aide for security affairs and counter-terrorism, and representatives from the justice, defence and finance ministries and the country's general intelligence.
