Egypt on Monday launched search and rescue operations with the help of Libyan coastal authorities after dozens of people were feared drowned when their boat capsized, officials said.

President Mohamed Morsy will fly to China on Monday for a three-day visit, where he will meet directly with President Hu Jintao to sign agreements to stimulate trade and investment.

Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Qandil has said that the country would not be harmed by accepting a contentious $4.8 billion loan that Egypt is set to receive from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

A presidential delegation met with a number of extremist Islamists on Saturday in the Sinai city of Sheikh Zuwayed, Egyptian security sources told the German news agency DPA Sunday.

A number of delegations from Egypt's Constituent Assembly – tasked with drafting a new national charter – will travel to six different countries to discuss a draft constitution with Egyptian expatriate communities abroad, Abdel-Fattah Khattab, rapporteur for the assembly's recommendations committee, announced on Sunday.

Laboratory tests show that all water sources in the village of Sansaft, Monufiya are polluted, said Health Minister Mohamed Mostafa Hamed at a press conference Sunday.

Egypt's Prime Minister, Hisham Kandil, has revealed that a draft of the country's new constitution will be ready for approval by nationwide referendum by the end of September, according to a report from the state-run MENA news agency.

Former MP Mohamed Abu Hamed, one of the organizers of the 24 August protests, said that protesters will continue their sit-in in front of the presidential palace “until the revolution achieves its goals.”

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Electricity said that a man who set fire to himself in front of the presidential palace on Saturday was a former employee who had been fired for forgery and bribery.

Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi has accepted an invitation from German chancellor Angela Merkel to visit Europe's largest nation, the state-run news agency MENA reported on Saturday.

Presidential Spokesperson Yasser Ali said the security situation in Sinai is improving due to the security forces' continued crackdown on militants in a press statement Saturday.

The police have identified 120 individuals in North Sinai who are allegedly wanted for attacking police stations and killing policemen, said a security source in the area on Wednesday.

The Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights (EOHR) has released a statement condemning the confiscation by authorities of the Wednesday edition of weekly newspaper Al-Shaab, which is affiliated with Egypt's Islamist-leaning Labour Party.

President Mohamed Morsi will visit the United States on 23 September for the first time since taking power in June, the presidential spokesperson said on Wednesday.

Workers from the privatized Steam Boilers Company, the Ideal Company and the Kouta Steel Company staged protests outside the presidential palace and the cabinet building on Wednesday, demanding the government buy the companies back and rehire laid off workers.

Egypt's Interior Ministry on Wednesday warned organizers planning a campaign of protests against President Mohamed Morsy on 24 August that it would respond "decisively" to any violence.

Christine Lagarde, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, arrived in Cairo Tuesday for a two-day visit to hold talks with officials over a long-anticipated loan.

An Egyptian military source, Sunday, rebuffed what he qualified as "the noise that is coming out of the Israeli media" over the deployment of army troops in Sinai beyond the limitations stipulated in the 1979 Camp David Accords.

The trial of Al-Dostour newspaper's editor-in-chief Islam Afify on charges of insulting President Mohamed Morsi and publishing inaccurate information will begin on Thursday at Giza Criminal Court.

Ahmed Idris, the investigating judge appointed by the justice minister to review cases of former officials who had acquired state-owned land, has reached an agreement with the defendants after they agreed to give up the land in question in exchange for not being prosecuted, judicial sources told Al-Masry Al-Youm that

The Chamber of Food Industries is blaming the Health Ministry for a bottled water shortage after the ministry ordered seven companies shut down in June, when they failed tests of their well water.