In the wake of the catastrophic blast in Beirut last week, Egypt’s Civil Aviation Authority on Monday announced a senior committee to look into whether any dangerous materials are stored in or near the country’s airports.
The decision by Aviation Minister Mohammed Manar appeared designed to avoid a disaster similar to the one that ravaged the Lebanese capital on August 4 when a huge blast tore through Beirut after a fire ignited 2,700 tonnes of ammonium nitrate stored at the city’s port.
The Beirut blast killed at least 163 people and wounded over 6,000.
The committee, led by the ministry’s security chief, will examine warehouses, shipments and storage yards in all of Egypt’s airports, according to a ministry statement.
The committee will “take precautionary measures regarding dangerous materials with the intent of immediately releasing them to their owners or transferring them to safe storage facilities outside airports and populated areas,” said the statement.
An explosion at a chemicals factory outside Cairo’s main airport injured a dozen people in 2018. Egypt’s state news agency MENA said at the time that the blast occurred in a storage facility belonging to a local petrochemicals company outside the airport in the eastern part of the capital, home to some 20 million people.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
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The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
SUZUME
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