Egypt's anti-corruption agency said today it had questioned former president Hosni Mubarak and his wife in a probe into corruption charges and ordered that both be detained pending further investigations.
Investigators interrogated Mr Mubarak, who has denied wrongdoing, for more than three hours yesterday evening in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, and questioned his wife Suzanne today, the state news agency MENA reported.
Mr Mubarak's wife would be detained for 15 days, MENA said. Security and judicial sources said she would be transferred to a Cairo prison.
It was the first detention order for the ousted president's wife, although the public prosecutor had already ordered Mr Mubarak be detained on April 13th as part of a separate investigation into charges of abuse of public funds and the killing of protesters.
The 83-year-old ruler, ousted by a popular uprising in February, has been staying at a hospital in Sharm el-Sheikh since he suffered health problems under initial questioning.
The prosecutor last month ordered Mr Mubarak to be transferred to a Cairo prison hospital but said it would take at least a month to make the necessary preparations.
"During its investigation, the agency confronted Mubarak with reports from comptrollers regarding unlawful gains not commensurate with his legitimate income during his career," the state news agency said, citing Assem el-Gohari, a senior justice ministry official.
MENA also said the former president and his wife had signed documents in Arabic, English and French agreeing to reveal information about their domestic and foreign bank accounts.
Some media reports have suggested the Mubarak family's wealth may total billions of dollars, a major rallying point for anti-government protests in a country where some 40 per cent of the population live on less than $2 per day.
Egypt's foreign ministry told its embassies in the Arab world and Western countries on February 22nd to freeze the assets of the toppled leader and his family.
Switzerland's Foreign Ministry said earlier this month the country had found 410 million Swiss francs (€325 million) traced to Mr Mubarak.
Reuters