Egyptian Minister of Environment, Yasmine Fouad, announced Wednesday that Egypt is the first Arab country to announce its standards for environmental sustainability. Back in November, the cabinet announced the first Egyptian standards for environmental sustainability, she said. At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Egypt took its decision to go green with its budget, according to Fouad. Egypt, in conjunction with its orientation towards rebuilding better, is working on setting the general framework for the green recovery strategy as part of the overall national strategy for climate change, which comes as a result of integrated work from all ministries, she explained. The minister assured that a national political commitment is in place regarding climate change by placing the National Council for Climate Change under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly and with the membership of all relevant ministries and sectors.

Egyptian authorities have continued to open Rafah land crossing in North Sinai with the Gaza strip on Wednesday. Egypt has been operating the crossing exceptionally since May 16 to facilitate the crossing of stranded people and humanitarian cases on both sides, and to enter in various aid and reconstruction materials into the strip. Egypt had brokered a ceasefire that ended an 11-day war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza in May. The Rafah crossing is not designated for bringing in aid and goods, and is governed by an international agreement that has been invalidated since the Islamic movement Hamas took control of the strip in 2007. Hamas expelled Palestinian Authority forces from Gaza in 2007 when the armed Islamist movement seized power.

With the Islamist militant movement back in power, the absence of a functioning financial intelligence unit (FIU) could curtail Afghanistan’s links to the international financial system and to lenders abroad, some experts warned. A Taliban spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the status of FinTRACA staff or whether the unit would operate in future. The U.S. Treasury, which provided technical assistance to the unit with other national and international bodies, declined to comment on FinTRACA staff still in Afghanistan. One FinTRACA staff member said it was still disconnected on Tuesday. “The FATF is closely monitoring the developing situation in Afghanistan,” the group said in a statement.

Egypt’s Ministry of Health and Population on Tuesday reported 503 new coronavirus cases, 10 deaths, and 325 recoveries. A total of 293,951 cases have been disclosed in Egypt, alongside 16,895 deaths and 247,450 recoveries. Moreover, the Health Ministry has stated that official figures likely only represent 10 percent of actual cases. Egypt is set to receive 5.2 million doses of the Moderna and Pfizer coronavirus vaccines in September, Zayed announced. Additionally, presidential health advisor Mohamed Awad Tag al-Din said in September that Egypt will be receiving 25 million doses of Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot Janssen vaccine over the next four months.

The third season of “al-Ikhtiyar (The Choice)”, is set to feature an ensemble array of starts such as Yasser Galal, who will portray President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, and Sabry Fawaz who will play the role of late President Mohamed Morsi. The third part of the series is expected to provoke controversy due to landmark events it will cover, including Morsi’s presence as a character. The script will be written by Hany Sarhan, with director Peter Mimi from the first two seasons returning to direct. It is also scheduled to bring together actors Ahmed al-Sakka and Karim Abdel Aziz, who participated in the second part, as well as Amir Karara, who played the role of Ahmed al-Mansy in the first part. The third season goes over events in Egypt following the January 25 revolution, and what occurred under the Muslim Brotherhood and Morsi.

Abbas sent a copy of the letter to the presidents of the African Union and the African Union Commission. He listed the damage caused to Sudan as a result of misinformation and lack of coordination in the filling of GERD. Algeria is country leading efforts to bring the three countries together on negotiations table with the aim of reaching an agreement on filling and operating GERD. Egypt and Sudan say they want a legally binding agreement in this regard, while Ethiopia says any pact should be advisory. Negotiations over the dam between Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan have stalled for years, with the three parties ultimately failing to reach any agreements.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla., Sept 15 (Reuters) – The latest in a recent line of space-obsessed billionaires was set for liftoff on Wednesday with three less wealthy private citizens along for the ride aboard a SpaceX rocket ship, seeking to become the first all-civilian crew launched into Earth orbit. They will fly aboard a gleaming white SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, dubbed Resilience, perched atop one of the company’s reusable Falcon 9 rockets and fitted with a special observation dome in place of the usual docking hatch. Despite some largely honorary titles, the Inspiration4 crew will have no part to play in flying the spacecraft, which will be operated by ground-based flight teams and onboard guidance systems, even though two crew members are licensed pilots. Biomedical data and biological samples, including ultrasound scans, will also be collected from crew members before, during and after the flight. Reporting by Julio-Cesar Chavez in Cape Canaveral, Florida; Writing and additional reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Peter Cooney

Egypt’s Public Prosecution on Tuesday referred two doctors and an employee in a private hospital to criminal trial over forcing a nurse to bow to dog. The Public Prosecution charged the suspects with bullying the nurse as they ordered him to bow to an animal owned by the first suspect, taking advantage of their authority over him with the intent of making him a subject of ridicule and degrading. The prosecution accused the defendants of assaulting the values of the Egyptian society and violating the victim’s privacy by uploading the video online. Security authorities on Tuesday arrested a doctor who appeared in a video that went viral on social media, shown bullying a nurse and forcing him to bow down to a dog. The suspects justified what appeared in the video as a habitual acceptance from the victim to their joking.

The launches came amid a flurry of activity on the peninsula, including high-level diplomatic talks and South Korea’s testing a newly developed submarine-launched ballistic missile of its own. South Korea’s military has raised its level of surveillance, and is maintaining a full readiness posture in close cooperation with the United States, the JCS added. The U.S. military’s Indo-Pacific Command said North Korea’s missile launches did not pose an immediate threat to U.S. personnel, territory, or allies, but highlight the destabilising impact of its illicit weapons programme. MISSILE RACEMoon was attending the test firing of a South Korean submarine-launched ballistic missile when word came of the North Korean launches, its first ballistic missile tests since March this year. Both Koreas have been developing a range of new missiles and other weapons, but North Korea’s ballistic missile systems have been banned by United Nations Security Council resolutions.

PARIS (AP) — Health care workers in France face suspension from their jobs starting Wednesday if they haven’t been vaccinated against COVID-19. Nearly 90 percent of French health care workers are estimated to be vaccinated, and polls suggest most people support the vaccine mandate for medical staff. The government health authority said Tuesday that 300,000 health workers remained unvaccinated. If health care workers have had only one dose, they have to take a virus test every three days until they have completed the second one. But a small, vocal minority of people are opposed to the coronavirus vaccines, including some health care workers.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghanistan’s new foreign minister said Tuesday that the Taliban governing the country remain committed to not allowing militants to use their territory to launch attacks. Amir Khan Mutaqi, a longtime Taliban negotiator named as foreign minister, appeared Tuesday at his first news conference since becoming a member of the interim government. A burgeoning IS affiliate has claimed responsibility for most recent attacks, including the horrific bombing outside the Kabul airport that killed 13 U.S. service personnel and 169 Afghans during last month’s chaotic evacuations. Several of the interim ministers, including Mutaqi, Prime Minister Mohammad Hasan Akhund and Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani, are on the U.N.’s so-called black list of international terrorists and terrorist financers. As the interim interior minister, he oversees Afghanistan’s police and has already called former officers back to work.

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s former prime minister left the country for the United States on Tuesday, his advisor said, despite a subpoena from the judge investigating last year’s devastating explosion at Beirut port. Hassan Diab was the country’s prime minister when the explosion happened on Aug. 4, 2020. Diab was caretaker prime minister until last week, when Najib Mikati successfully formed a new government, ending months of political haggling. As caretaker prime minister, Diab was summoned by investigative judge Tarek Bitar on accusations of intentional killing and negligence. On Tuesday, Bitar issued a new subpoena to include his home address after he stepped down from the premiership.

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin criticized the presence of foreign troops in Syria, saying they are there against the will of the Syrian government and are blocking the consolidation of the war-torn country, the Kremlin said Tuesday. Putin was referring to hundreds of US troops stationed in eastern Syria and working with Kurdish-led fighters in battling the militant Islamic State group, as well as Turkish forces in northern Syria. Hundreds of Russian troops are deployed across Syria and they also have a military air base along Syria’s Mediterranean coast. Assad and Putin discussed cooperation between their armies and ways to continue operations to gain control of the last rebel-held areas in Syria, state media in Damascus reported. “Only a consolidation of all forces in Syria will allow the country to get on its feet and start steady development, moving forward,” Putin said.

The Egyptian Tourism and Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anany inaugurated on Monday a project to restore the south tomb of King Djoser in Saqqara, finalizing rehabilitation work which began in 2006. The Secretary-General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Mostafa Waziri, explained that the south tomb of King Djoser is located in the southern corner of his funerary complex in the Saqqara antiquities area. The tomb consists of two parts, he said: the upper part is a terrace building made of limestone, with a frieze decorated with cobra snakes. The tomb was opened for visits starting from Tuesday, with the prices of visit tickets for Egyptians being LE 40, Egyptian students LE 20, foreigners LE 100, and foreign students LE 50. The visit includes the entrance to the south tomb, the well to its end, and the sarcophagus.

CAIRO - 14 Septemebr 2020: United Nations Resident Coordinator in Egypt Elena Panova lauded the recent legislative reforms that have been carried out by Egypt to economically empower women. Since 1994, human development reports have carry out a pivotal role in shaping the policy dialogues in Egypt, she noted. This report was released after almost a decade, she said, citing the release of the last Egypt Human Development Report in 2010. The report comes at a extremely critical moment, as the world countries, including Egypt, are suffering from the repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic, Panova added. UN Resident Coordinator in Egypt Elena Panova said that the Egyptian government adopted "bold decisions" to launch the second economic structural reforms and renew its commitment to adopt further reform measures.