The Egyptian ambassador in Australia, Omar Metwali, received 122 archeological pieces from Australian authorities. The pieces were retrieved from an auction house in Melbourne in November 2010. The Egyptian embassy in Australia issued a statement announcing the Australian authorities caught these pieces after the Egyptian embassy presented an official request to retrieve them. The archeological pieces date back to the Pharaonic, Greek and Roman eras.

According to the agreement signed between Egypt and Japan concerning the technical requirements of the company to carry out the third phase of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) overlooking the Giza Plateau, the GEM Committee will prepare a shortlist of the qualified companies proposed in the bid to select the winning one.

Twelve antiques dealers were arrested in Minya province by Police detectives cooperating with the Public Security Authority after they tried to sell artifacts taken from tombs. Major Gen. Ahmed Gamal, assistant Minister of Interior for public security, said that 12 antiques dealers in the city of Adwa were attempting to sell ten granite statues, 12 metal statues, a statue on a black granite base, and four scarabs.

After a nine month pause due to lack of security following Egypt’s January revolution, seventy five foreign archaeological missions resumed their work today all over Egypt. “These missions are 25 per cent of the foreign archaeological missions who work in Egypt,” said Mohamed Ismail supervisor of the Permanent Committee and Foreign Missions Affairs Section at the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA).

The dismantlement of an international mummy and artifact smuggling ring by US authorities in July raised alarms about the status of stolen Egyptian artifacts in transnational black markets. The daily newspaper Metro-New York recently reported that three New York men were arrested for smuggling 2000-year-old Egyptian artifacts into the US from the United Arab Emirates by lying custom officials about the contents of their luggage.

The University of Bonn said that researchers have discovered a carcinogenic substance in a flask of lotion believed to have belonged to Queen Hatshepsut — raising a possibility she may have accidentally poisoned herself. Researchers spent two years researching the dried-out contents of the flask, which is part of its Egyptian Museum's collection and bears an inscription saying it belonged to Hatshepshut.

Following two months of the cancelation of the Ministry of State for Antiquities Affairs, Prime Minister Essam Sharaf appointed Mohamed Abdel Fatah the new Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities. Abdel Fatah was the head of the Ancient Egyptian Antiquities sector at the SCA. He previously served as head of the Museums sectors and director of Antiquities in Upper Egypt.

Excavations on the Avenue of Sphinxes, a key element of the large project to convert Luxor into an open museum, intended to unearth the route that linked the Luxor and Karnak Temple in Pharaonic times, have come to a halt. While visiting the town in May to give impetus to the project, incumbent Prime Minister Essam Sharaf promised that the excavations would be resumed, so that the reclaimed Avenue of the Sphinxes would be inaugurated in October at the start of tourism’s high season. Despite his promise, the situation is at a standstill.

The Egyptian police authority confiscated 22 archeological statutes from a suspect who was allegedly trying to make money from selling the artifacts.

The Egyptian Military Operations Authority discovered the nameplate of King Apries in the Tal Defna area in Ismailia. The plate is made up of two pieces of red sandstone with two cartouches bearing the name Wah-ib-ra (Apries) inscribed.