Egyptian authorities shut down Masr al-Arabia after police raided the office of the news website in Giza late on Tuesday and arrested its editor-in-chief accusing him of operating the site without a permit.
The raid came two days after the Supreme Council for Media Regulation told the website to pay 50,000 Egyptian pounds ($2,849) as a fine following a complaint made by the national election authority for republishing a New York Times article on alleged irregularities during last week's presidential election, which was won by President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi after garnering 97 percent of the votes.
“The website should have checked the authenticity of the news or commented on it with an opinion," the Council statement said.
The Interior Ministry has released a statement stating that the office of Masr al-Arabia has been raided because it didn’t have a permit to operate.
The website and dozens of other news sites have been blocked in Egypt. But the authorities haven’t announced the reasons.
The Egyptian newspaper El-Masri El-Youm has been fined 150,000 pounds ($8,500) over a main headline saying the state is deploying voters. The newspaper published an apology on Tuesday.
