Photos: Prosecution orders arresting suspects who created fake pharaonic tomb in Upper Egypt

CAIRO – 18 February 2023: The Public Prosecution said it has issued an arrest warrant for suspects who created a fake pharaonic tomb in Upper Egypt’s Beni Suef to defraud buyers of antiquities of their money.

Last week, Secretary-General of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities Mostafa Waziri said he headed to the tomb and found that the paintings on the wall do not belong to the ancient Egyptian civilization.

In remarks to Egypt Today, Waziri added that all the figurines inside the tomb were made of gypsum and that all the contents of that tomb were not ancient.

Security forces found a group of people with a pickup truck over a hill in a desert area in El-Fashn town in Beni Suef, who escaped when security forces approached them, the prosecution said in a statement on Friday.

When reaching the site, the forces found a number of pharaonic figurines beside a two-meter-deep hole covered with an iron door that was closed with locks.

The forces opened the iron cover and found that the hole leads to a basement with three underground rooms, the prosecution said, adding that the forces thought the tomb might be ancient as it contained artefacts that look like genuine pharaonic figurines.

However, a committee formed by the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities moved to the scene along with the prosecution and revealed in a report that the tomb is not ancient, the prosecution said.

The hole contained iron rods that were used to reinforce its construction, the committee said.

Also, the drawings engraved on the walls of the three rooms and the statues they contain were all modern imitations and not ancient, the committee added.