Fifteen more days THE PROSECUTOR-general on Tuesday extended for the fourth time the detention of leading Muslim Brotherhood figure Mahmoud Ezzat and 23 others for 15 days. The group's members were arrested along with Ezzat, the fourth highest-ranking official in the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, during a government crackdown sparked by a wave of pro-reform protests that began in late March. Ezzat is the Brotherhood's secretary-general and head of its Cairo operations and one of the highest ranking members to have been arrested in recent years. On Sunday, the state security prosecutor also extended for 15 days the detention of prominent Brotherhood figure Essam El-Erian and three others. In 1990, the 52-year-old El-Erian served a five-year term on charges of belonging to a banned group working to overthrow the regime. The men face charges of belonging to a banned group, organising unauthorised protests and sedition. Emergency laws introduced in 1981 allow the state to hold suspects for up to six months without trial and allows authorities to re-arrest them indefinitely. The Brotherhood, which advocates an Islamic government, renounced violence in the 1970s. Running as independents, they form the largest opposition bloc in the 454-member parliament with 15 seats. 2010 wrongdoings AFTER more than a year of a formal inquiry into the reasons behind Egypt's failure to host the 2010 World Cup, the Administrative Prosecutor's office on Monday announced 49 shortcomings in how the bid was handled, reports Reem Nafie. The Ministry of Youth, the Radio and Television Union, the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) and EgyptAir were among those blamed for the bid's failure in which Egypt did not collect a single vote. The debacle was since dubbed "The Zero". The Ministry of Youth with its various committees including sports, financial, legal, the minister's central management office, the Egyptian Football Association (EFA) and the committee responsible for the bid file, were accused of 40 faults alone. These included not taking the necessary procedures to release contracts for the companies working on the bid file, not informing the tax authorities about some of the money spent, not delegating technical committees to oversee the work performed by companies contracted and not informing companies dealt with what is requested of them. The prosecutor further requested that the Ministry of Youth form a specialised technical committee to review the works of the French company Expert Stad which received nearly LE8 million from the Ministry of Youth to help organise the 2010 bid campaign. Twenty-nine officials working on the bid file have been sent to a disciplinary court. Plane grounded AVIATION Minister Ahmed Shafiq has ordered the grounding of a charter plane operated by AMC, a private Egyptian company, and the questioning of its owner over technical problems in the plane, writes Amirah Ibrahim. On Saturday, an AMC plane bound for Paris from Hurghada with 163 French passengers failed to take off following a technical problem with its air conditioning. A maintenance crew repaired the fault, however, 97 of the passengers refused to board the plane because of fears over its safety. The rest embarked and the aircraft reached Charles de Gaulle Airport more than six hours late. AMC owner and chairman Sayed Saber complained that French aviation authorities prevented the plane from taking off to Luxor with 91 passengers after they were informed about the morning's events. "They locked the crew inside the plane for six hours until the plane was inspected," Saber said. The French airport operating company, Aéroports de Paris, said the authorities had declared the AMC McDonnell Douglas flight worthy after inspecting it. "We contacted the French authorities to ask why they had blocked the aircraft's takeoff, kept the crew inside the plane for six hours and did not provide the pilot or the Egyptian authorities with a report over the incident," Shafiq said. He said the plane was grounded in order to be inspected by Egyptian authorities despite the fact that the French had given the all-clear to the plane. "If the inspection reveals any defects in any aeroplane, the airline will be banned," Shafiq added. Currently the whole fleet is being inspected and no defects were so far found. Environmental pride UNESCO has announced that Wadi Al-Hitan (Whale Valley) in the Fayoum Desert will be designated the first natural heritage spot in Egypt and one of the most important in the world, reports Mahmoud Bakr. The decision, taken unanimously on Thursday last week, was made by UNESCO's International Heritage Committee at a meeting in Durban, South Africa. The Whale Valley fossils, in Egypt's Western Desert, show the evolution of the whale as an ocean-going mammal from a previous life as a land-based animal. Whale fossils can be found at Wadi Hitan, which has a unique ecosystem of waterfalls, moist lands and rare fossils, that show animals in the last stages of losing their hind limbs. Minister of Environment Maged George said the Egyptian government had put a programme in place to protect natural reserves in an attempt to place them on the international tourist agenda. In collaboration with the Geological Museum and the University of Michigan, the Ministry of Environment wants to restore the skeletons found in Wadi Hitan to conduct more research and train able staff for future restoration. A plan has also been devised with the help of the Egyptian-Italian Cooperation Programme to preserve the valley. Twenty-four reserves covering 10 per cent of Egypt have been designated protected areas. The number is expected to increase to 40 by 2017. Newspapers galore THE HIGHER Press Council (HPC) has approved 12 new newspapers, reports Salonaz Sami. Among the newspapers approved at a meeting headed by HPC President Safwat El-Sherif on Tuesday was Al-Karama headed by MP Hamdeen Sabahi and Al-Forsan sports newspaper led by Osama Khalil. "It's been a long struggle since 1997 when we first applied for a license to issue a newspaper," Sabahi told Al-Ahram Weekly. "The newspaper will be out in two months," he added. During the meeting, the HPC said it was organising a training course for journalists regarding the coverage of the upcoming presidential elections. The newly appointed heads of newspapers and the Middle East News Agency took their oaths during the meeting. Salah Montasser was appointed representative of the council in the Press Syndicate disciplinary committee. The council's board will form a higher committee in charge of monitoring the elections of board of directors of national press institutions. The committee will be headed by Ragaa El-Arabi, deputy chairman of the constitutional committee in the Shura Council.
