The interior ministry dropped on Monday complaints against two newspapers "as part of the ministry's efforts to strengthen its relationship with the different parties in the nation and different media outlets," a prosecution statement read.
The interior ministry had filed a complaint to the prosecution on two separate occasions against private newspapers Al-Masry Al-Youm (AMAY) in April and Al-Youm Al-Sabea in May, describing the papers' reporting as "unprofessional" and "threatening to public security."
On Monday, the prosecution questioned Youm 7's Editor-in-Chief Khaled Salah and another editor at the paper, El-Sayed Falah, accusing both of publishing false news, inciting fear among the public, and threatening public security.
The ministry said the paper published a false report on 11 June about alleged terrorists who attacked vehicles which belong to the presidency. According to the report, the vehicles were attacked after leaving the coastal resort of Sharm El-Sheikh, where Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi had been attending the African economic summit.
Salah and Falah were both released on bail.
In April, the ministry also filed a legal complaint with the prosecution against AMAY for publishing a seven-page series of reports titled “The Police: Martyrs and Sins… Holes in the Official Uniform,” highlighting what it described as the “coercive and arrogant” practices of police.
Last Wednesday, 300 journalists staged a protest at the Journalists' Syndicate in downtown Cairo against the imprisonment of their colleagues, criticising what they described as the stifling of press freedoms in Egypt.
