Egypt

CAIRO, Mar 15 (NNN-MENA) – The remittances from Egyptian expatriates rose to 31.5 billion U.S. dollars in 2021, compared to 29.6 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) said yesterday.

The remittances in 2021 grew by 6.4 percent, year on year, CBE said in a statement.

The remittances, along with the revenue of the Suez Canal, the tourism sector, and foreign investment, are a major source of foreign currency in the country.

11 March 2022; MEMO: The We Record human rights organisation revealed that it had documented the execution of seven Egyptian citizens over the past few days, noting that this is the first incident of executions in a politically motivated case since the start of the year.

CAIRO, March 10 (Reuters) - Islamic State confirmed the death of its leader Abu Ibrahim Al-hashemi Al-Quraishi on Thursday and announced Abu Al-Hassan Al-hashemi Al-Quraishi as its new leader.

U.S. special forces killed the leader of the jihadist group in a raid in northwest Syria, President Joe Biden said in February.

The death of Quraishi, 45, was another crushing blow to IS two years after the violent Sunni Muslim group lost longtime leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in a similar raid in 2019.

09 March 2022; MEMO: Meat prices are expected to rise about 50 per cent in Egypt, the head of the Egyptian Farmers' Syndicate announced yesterday.

Hussein Abu Saddam told local media that Egypt imports more than 50 per cent of its meat, poultry and fish and this was causing prices to increase.

08 March 2022; MEMO: The Russian invasion of Ukraine may cost Egypt $955 million in wheat import bills as wheat prices hit record highs.

Egypt imports roughly 70 per cent of its wheat from Russia and Ukraine and fears are growing in Cairo that a protracted conflict will severely disrupt their supply.

CAIRO (AP) — Libya’s east-based army rounded up at least 50 people in a coastal city following a prison escape earlier this year, a rights group said Tuesday.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement that an armed group affiliated with the self-styled Libyan Arab Armed Forces launched the crackdown after five prisoners escaped from a prison in the city of Derna on Jan. 16.

CAIRO (AP) — Libya’s national oil company said it resumed oil production Tuesday from the country’s largest field three days after an armed group shut it down.

The state-run National Oil Corporation said pump valves at the Sharara field were opened a few minutes after midnight local time.

It said it lifted a force majeure, a legal maneuver that lets a company get out of its contracts because of extraordinary circumstances.

The company said technical workers were working to resume production from el-Feel oil field.

CAIRO, March 6 (Xinhua) -- Nearly 100 female judges assumed office at Egypt's State Council for the first time in the country's history, the Egyptian judiciary body announced Sunday.

The 98 judges, who were sworn in on Saturday, were appointed last year under a presidential decree to work in the circuits of the State Commissioners' Authority, Mohamed Mahmoud Hossameldin, the council's president, said in a statement.

CAIRO (AP) — The U.N.’s top official for Libya on Monday called for lifting the production blockade at two oil fields including the country’s largest, as oil prices soared to over $130 a barrel.

Stephanie Williams, the U.N. special adviser on Libya, said blocking oil production from the Sharara and el-Feel fields “deprives all Libyans from their major source of revenue.”

“The oil blockade should be lifted,” she said on Twitter.

The closures have caused Libya’s daily production of oil to drop by 330,000 barrels, according to the state-run National Oil Corporation.

02 March 2022; MEMO: The ambassadors of the G7 group called on Egypt to issue a "clear condemnation" of the unjustified Russian invasion and support "the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine," stressing that the group is working to impose more sanctions on Russia in the coming days.