CAIRO: Former presidential candidate Abdel Moneim Abul Fotouh said yesterday his party will contest Egypt’s next parliamentary elections, boycotted by the main opposition coalition. The Strong Egypt Party is to field candidates in the staggered legislative polls which start on April 22. Abul Fotouh told reporters in Cairo he believed parties had to “stand up to authority” in order to avoid the monopolisation of power. A former member of President Mohammed Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood, Abul Fotouh founded the Strong Egypt Party in July 2012 after his defeat in a presidential election a month earlier. He came in fourth in a first round of polling, with 18 per cent of the vote. Egypt’s main opposition bloc, the National Salvation Front which groups mainly liberal and leftist movements, announced last week it was boycotting the legislative elections, doubting their transparency.
Pakistan, Iran to launch gas pipeline on Monday
tehran: The gas pipeline project between Pakistan and Iran is due to launch officially on Monday. According to Pakistani media, the pipeline will enable the export of 21.5 million cubic metres of Iran’s natural gas to Pakistan on a daily basis. Iran has already built more than 900 km of the pipeline on its soil. The two sides have set up a joint contracting company to build the pipeline in the next 15 months.
String of attacks kill 13 in Iraq
BAGHDAD: A string of bombings and shootings in Iraq killed 13 people and wounded at least 35 others yesterday, security and medical officials said.
Two car bombs targeted police in the restive northern city of Kirkuk, killing five and wounding at least 18, while gunmen killed a town council member and a North Oil Company employee south of the city, police and a health official said. A car bomb exploded near a football field southeast of Baquba, a city north of Baghdad, killing three people and wounding another 17.Agencies
