The Egyptian government is hoping to cultivate wheat and other cereals on fertile land in African countries to feed its growing population of over 80 million. In early September it signed a deal with the Sudanese government to give Egyptian companies access to Sudanese farmland. 'Growing essential crops like wheat in other water-rich African countries where fertile land is in abundance is an important solution,' said Ayman Farid Abu Hadid, chairman of the state-run Agricultural Research Centre, which signed the deal on behalf of the Egyptian government.

The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) has launched a new advocacy campaign to combat sectarianism in Egypt under the slogan, 'Reject Sectarianism'. The organisation said that the campaign is a joint movement and an appeal for collective action to eliminate sectarianism and strengthen the values of equal citizenship and shared existence.

The Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights (EOHR) has expressed its condemnation on the closing of the transmission of El Badr channel by the Egyptian government. It considers this act to be a violation of the right to freedom of expression and opinion, which is guaranteed by the Egyptian Constitution and International Convention of Human Rights. On 1 October 2010, the Egyptian satellite company Nilesat shut down the transmission of El Badr channel and thus violated the previously agreed-upon terms and conditions.

The cancellation by Egyptian security of an international NGO conference in Cairo, just two days before it was to take place, is a brazen example of the government’s increasingly hostile behavior towards civil society, according to Freedom House. The conference, entitled 'Freedom of Association in the Arab World: Reality and Expectations', was organised by One World Foundation in cooperation with Al Sadat Association.

As the 2010 peace talks involving leaders from Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, and the United States–began, Egyptian bloggers were already expressing skepticism about their outcome. The Egyptian newspaper Al Ahram saw things differently using Photoshop to place Mubarak front and center in the lineup of heads of state. As a result of Al Ahram's creative reporting, bloggers, both in Egypt and abroad, have taken the opportunity to demonstrate their artistic skills, using Photoshop to further doctor the image.

Companies access to farm land in Sudan, the first deal of its kind between the two countries, an agriculture ministry official has said. The agreement would allow Egyptian firms to grow crops on 1 million feddans (1.04 million acres) [400,000 hectares] of land, said Saad Nassar, advisor to Egypt’s agriculture minister.

Thirty Egyptians, aged 18 to 28, joined hands to produce 10 social advertisements, aimed at social reform.
The project, aptly named Closing The Gap, consisted of three phases held in partnership between The Egyptian Life Center for Creativity and Culture jointly with Freedom House.

Human rights activists in Egypt have expressed concern following allegations that a woman was raped by two police officers. She took the unusual step of appearing on television to give an interview about her ordeal. The woman claims that the rape took place on a deserted rural road in the Nile Delta, north of Cairo.

Egypt's biggest opposition bloc, the Muslim Brotherhood, has set up a website to help potential presidential candidate Mohamed ElBaradei gather support in his campaign for change and political reform. The website, also joined by other opposition groups, has collected almost 3,000 signatures since its launch late on Wednesday, in a sign the banned group is capable of mustering large numbers of supporters for a cause.

Anti-corruption watchdogs have shown their teeth, but Egypt's fat cats appear safe from prosecution as long as they stay in favour with the regime. "The state investigates corruption but usually only after officials are out of office, and only with the green light from above," says anti-corruption expert Ahmed Sakr Ashour. "We need (to prosecute) these officials while they are in office and abusing power."

Two police officers are to be prosecuted for their involvement in a young activist's death in Alexandria on 6 June 2010 but the charges being brought against them do not include murder. The activist, Khaled Mohammed Said, was beaten to death outside an Internet café after being arrested by two plain-clothes police officers. His family and local human rights organisations say he had just posted a video online showing police officers sharing the proceeds from a drug deal.

Egypt's recently concluded Shura Council elections were accompanied by widespread reports of serious electoral breaches by the ruling party. According to analysts and opposition figures, such voting "irregularities" bode poorly for upcoming parliamentary and presidential elections.

Early marriage is a form of violence against women. The young female takes a responsibility with number of consequences based on a sexual relation that she did not choose to have. Moreover, the marriage takes place at an age when the young girl is not ready neither physically nor psychologically to bear the consequences of such relation.

Despite the important achievements so far in the field of women rights and the continuous efforts from both the state and the civil society to protect and promote these rights. Yet some traditional practices that seriously violate women rights still persist. Among those practices, is female circumcision, which is still unfortunately widely spread in Egypt. The government started recently combating this phenomena under increasing international pressure, where it is considered as a serious violation of women rights.

The Land Centre for Human Rights has received dozens of complaints of some temporary workers in the governmental sector and the private sector, which were affected by the violation of their rights to decent work and the lack of safeguards to protect them from displacement, segregation. To make it worse, the government agencies use such employment without editing work contracts to them, or to give them health and social insurance, in a violation to the law and conventions of international labor organization.

At an energy consultation on June 29 for which it took weeks to finalize a date, 25 Egyptians from various segments of society, including NGOs, academic institutions, and private firms, all had one clear message for the World Bank to think about when designing its new energy strategy: "focus on renewable energy projects."

The Egyptian authorities have charged two plain-clothed police officers in connection with the death of a 28-year-old man in Alexandria a month ago. Witnesses say Khaled Said died after he was dragged out of an internet cafe and beaten up. The government says he swallowed a packet of drugs and choked.

Potential Egyptian presidential candidate Mohamed ElBaradei led thousands of people on Friday in an anti-torture protest that analysts said was significant for joining disparate groups in a common cause. Around 4,000 people, representing varied political views, and many ordinary citizens greeted ElBaradei, 68, the former nuclear inspector, as he visited the port city of Alexandria to offer condolences to the family of Khaled Mohammed Said, an Egyptian who rights groups say was beaten to death by police.

A water-sharing treaty among five upstream Nile Basin countries - to the exclusion of Egypt and Sudan - has reignited the longstanding dispute over water distribution. Local experts, however, say the agreement will not jeopardise Egypt's historical share of Nile water. "Egypt has relied on the waters of the Nile for thousands of years," Hani Raslan, head of the department for Sudan and Nile Basin countries at the Cairo-based Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, told IPS. "No one can set a limit on Egypt's use of the Nile, which is protected by international law."

The Second Refugee Film Festival will be held in June 17-20, 2010 at the open air Cinema in Darb 1718 for Contemporary Art and Culture in commemoration of World Refugee Day. The festival will include screenings of 11 documentary and fiction films portraying the resilience of refugees. It will also include a two-day Bazaar of Eritrean, Iraqi, Sudanese and Palestinian food and handicrafts.The festival will end on June 20th with a closing concert by talented Sudanese artists featuring Reggae, blues and folk music.