The Supreme Media Regulatory Council (SMRC) has received 284 requests to license websites, newspapers, and television channels under the terms of the new media law, according to statements by SMRC members on Tuesday. Around 198 licensing requests to register websites “failed to present the required documents for licensing,” according to …

Egyptian Minister of Planning and Economic Development Hala al-Saeed met Jan. 7 with Sameh Shenouda, CEO of Zarou, a wholly-owned unit by US private equity firm Blackstone, to discuss investment opportunities with Egypt’s sovereign wealth fund.

The Supreme Council for Media Regulation complained that the Council could observe, through its specialized committees, a repetition of serious professional mistakes by the BBC, with regard to covering the Egyptian issues, saying that theses systematic mistakes indicate clearly hostility of the Egyptian state.

The media policies of Egypt’s new information minister were approved in a cabinet meeting yesterday. Osama Heikal was appointed in December as the first state minister under the current President, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, five years after the post was abolished.

Egypt’s parliament approved Dec. 22 a Cabinet reshuffle, whereby it was decided to reinstate the country’s Ministry of Information that had been abolished in 2014 as per the 2014 constitution, which considered the ministry to be part of the state’s control over the media under then-President Hosni Mubarak.

Egypt’s Administrative Control Authority (ACA) arrested on Friday the head of the Egyptian Tax Authority (ETA) Ali Abdel Azeem Hussein for cases of bribery.

Kuwaiti human rights activists and lawmakers have criticised a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed by the Gulf state’s Anti-Corruption Authority (Nazaha) with the Egyptian Administrative Control Authority (ACA) to fight corruption; saying Cairo is ranked among the countries with the highest level of corruption according to Transparency International.

President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi yesterday said that authorities have to block websites and set controls on them in order to protect the Egypt and stop them turning young people against their country.

Egypt’s Supreme Media Council has expressed its “deep dissatisfaction” with a Reuters report which details a new level of censorship over the news and entertainment industries.

The Supreme Media Council, headed by Makram Mohamed Ahmed, expressed in a statement on Saturday its deep dissatisfaction over a recent media report by Reuters on Egyptian TV series, vowing to take legal measures.