Egypt will open its only crossing with the Gaza Strip this weekend, the Cairo military government announced today, significantly easing a four-year blockade on the Hamas-ruled territory but setting up a potential conflict with Israel.

Egypt admitted today that oil has leaked from one of several rigs operating off the coast of the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.

A passenger train collided with the back of a second one ahead of it on the tracks just outside of Cairo tonight, destroying several passenger cars and killing at least 15 people.

Israeli ground forces made their deepest foray yet into Gaza’s most populated area, with tanks rolling into residential neighbourhoods and infantry fighting urban warfare in streets and buildings with Hamas militants.

A Cairo court has sentenced the editors of four outspoken Egyptian tabloids to a year in prison for defaming President Hosni Mubarak and his ruling party, judicial officials said today.

A 17-year-old Egyptian girl has died of bird flu, the country’s 12th death from the avian flu strain, it was reported today.

FURIOUS Egypt says a contest to name the new seven wonders of the world in which the ancient Pyramids of Giza must now compete with sites like Stonehenge, is a “disgrace”.

Mutations in the bird flu virus have been found in two people in Egypt, in a form that might be resistant to the medication most commonly used to treat the deadly disease, according to laboratory tests approved by WHO.

Bird flu has infected another Egyptian, bringing to 19 the number of people afflicted with the deadly H5N1 strain of the virus, according to reports today in Egyptian media.

A passenger train travelling towards a railway station in northern Egypt today collided with a second train, killing at least 58 people and injuring 143 – in the latest accident on Egypt’s dilapidated third-class railway service.

A passenger train sped into a northern Egypt railway station today and collided with a second train, killing 51 people and injuring 138.

An investigation into the sinking of a Red Sea ferry, that went down in February with a loss of more than 1,000 lives, has blamed the ship’s owners, a maritime safety body and the Egyptian government, Egypt’s semi-official news agency reported today.

Egypt reported its second human case of avian flu today while Israel continued its precautionary culling of hundreds of thousands of birds.

An Egyptian passenger ferry carrying around 1,300 people, mostly Egyptian workers returning from Saudi Arabia, sank in the Red Sea overnight.

Coast Guard vessels have pulled dozens of bodies from the water today after an Egyptian passenger ferry carrying around 1,300 people (or up to 1,415 according to some reports), mostly Egyptian workers returning from Saudi Arabia, sank in the Red Sea overnight.

Egyptian maritime director Mahfouz Taha Marzouk has said 12 survivors and 15 bodies have been picked up from a passenger ferry that has sunk in the Red Sea.

A tourist bus overturned on a highway in southern Egypt early today, killing 14 tourists from Hong Kong and injuring 30 more, some critically, Egypt’s news agency reported.

A section of a four-storey building collapsed in Alexandria today, killing eight people and injuring another eight, Egypt’s semi-official Middle East News Agency reported.

An Egyptian passenger cruiser carrying more than 1,300 Muslim pilgrims from Egypt collided late today with a Cypriot cargo ship at the southern entrance of the Suez Canal, port officials and state-run media said.

ISRAEL and the Palestinians have agreed on the logistics of the upcoming election to replace Yasser Arafat, a senior Palestinian official said yesterday.

Israel has reached agreement with the Palestinians on the logistics of their upcoming election, a senior Palestinian official said today, but denied reports the two sides worked out a broader deal to end their decades-old conflict.

Palestinians are furious over what they see as the world’s forgiving response to Israel’s unprecedented raid in northern Gaza that has killed dozens.

An Egyptian engineer working with a telecommunications company who was kidnapped in Iraq last week was freed today, Egypt’s Middle East News Agency reported.

EGYPT yesterday denied remarks by retired US General Tommy Franks that President Hosni Mubarak told him that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

A 12-storey building collapsed in a Cairo suburb on Monday night after a fire broke out on a ground floor store, killing at least four people, including three firefighters. Eleven people remained trapped in the rubble.

A flotilla of boats resumed searching today for flotsam and bodies from the charter jet of French tourists that crashed into the Red Sea, killing all 148 people aboard.

Egypt has released a leader of the militant group responsible for the assassination of former president Anwar Sadat after nearly 22 years in jail.

A suspected planner of the 1997 Luxor massacre that killed 62 people – mostly tourists – was handed over by Uruguayan authorities to Egyptian police, according to news reports.

CRUDE oil surged to a 12-year high for the second straight session as the US and Britain continued preparations to disarm Iraq

There were indications from Baghdad tonight that Saddam Hussein is prepared to obey UN instructions and destroy his al Samoud missiles.

Iraq will announce later today that it will comply with a UN order to begin destroying its Al Samoud 2 missiles by the weekend, the Egyptian Middle East News Agency reported.