Cairo Criminal Court upheld on Sunday a previous decision to freeze the assets of Mubarak-era tycoon Hussein Salem, his wife and children along with the assets of Mubarak’s oil minister Sameh Fahmy, his wife and son.

Salem, a close friend of ousted president Hosni Mubarak and owner of most Neama Bay hotels in Sharm El-Sheikh, had his assets frozen in early 2011 along with Fahmy and other Mubarak-era figures.

The businessman fled the country shortly after Mubarak's ouster and currently resides in Spain, where he holds a second nationality.

Both Salem and Fahmy were acquitted in the ‘exporting gas to Israel’ case. Mubarak, who was also acquitted, was initially charged with collaborating with his minister of petroleum to profit from Salem's company by giving Salem the right to export Egyptian natural gas to Israel at below market rates.

Egypt’s court of cassation can still decide to accept or reject an appeal in the case by the general prosecution on 4 June.

In February, Sameh was acquitted in a retrial on charges of squandering public funds in a gas deal with Israel, after initially receiving a 15-year prison sentence.

Salem, on the other hand, was sentenced to ten years in prison in September 2014, along with his son and daughter, for squandering public funds and illegally selling electricity.

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