The government committee tasked with seizing the assets of members of the banned Muslim Brotherhoodannounced on Wednesday that it froze the assets of anumber of businessmen including Mostafa Sakr, the publisher of the English-language newspaper Daily News Egypt and the Arabic-language Boursa News.

Sakr, whose assets were frozen for allegedly belonging to the Brotherhood, is the chairman of the Business News company, which owns the two aforementioned publications.

Business News issued a statement on Wednesday denying any affiliation with any political or religious group and vowed to challenge the committee’s decision in court.

“The company has been working in the press and media field since 2008, and neither it nor any of its employees or founders belong to any partisan, political or religious groups,” the company said.

The company added that ithas “never expressed any bias towards a particular group, while its editorial line is of a liberal nature.”

The statement also pointed out that President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi had published two op-eds in Daily News Egypt [in 2014 and 2015] on the country’s economic strategies during the annual Euromoney Egypt Conference.

Daily News Egypt has been a media sponsor of the Euromoney Egypt for several years.

The publication was launched in 2005 as Egypt's first independent English-language daily newspaper.

The paper briefly shut down in April 2012 but was re-launched in May of that year after it was acquired by Boursa News.

The committee to seize the assets of members ofthe Brotherhood was formed shortly after the group was designated as a terrorist organisation in late 2013.

https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/253109.aspx