Sunday, January 06, 2013

Egypt to replace finance and interior ministers - agency

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's finance and interior ministers are to be replaced, the state news agency said on Saturday, in moves promised by Islamist President Mohamed Mursi to assuage public anger at an economic crisis.

"Middle East News Agency has learned that the new ministers will include General Mohamed Ibrahim for the Interior Ministry and ... Al-Mursi Al-Sayed Hegazy for the Finance Ministry," MENA said.

Cabinet sources confirmed the moves. They said the new finance minister has a PhD degree in economics and has researched Islamic finance, and that the new interior minister had been an assistant to the previous interior minister.

The state agency said 10 new ministers would take the oath of office on Sunday for portfolios including electricity, environment, communications and transportation.

Egypt's economy and security conditions were seriously disrupted by the political turmoil that followed the 2011 uprising against former leader Hosni Mubarak.

The country's currency has lost about 10 percent of its value against the dollar since the start of 2011 - about a third of this in the last week alone.

A senior official from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) will meet Egypt's President, Prime Minister and other top officials on Monday to discuss Cairo's request for a $4.8 billion loan, a major state-run Egyptian newspaper reported on Saturday.

A cabinet official had said the loan talks would resume after being postponed last month when 11 died and hundreds were injured in anti-Mursi protests.

(Reporting by Ahmed Tolba and Yasmine Saleh, writing by Yasmine Saleh; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)