Ex-Egyptian PM Disappears after Deportation from UAE

The family of Shafik said on Sunday they have lost contact with him since they say he left Dubai for Cairo days after announcing his intention to run for president next year.

Shafik, a former air force chief and government minister, has been seen by critics of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as a potential challenger to the former military commander who is widely expected to run for a second term next year.

El-Sisi is closely allied to UAE and Saudi Arabia thus raising further speculation regarding the fate of Shafik.

Details about what happened to Shafik were unclear on Sunday. He made on Wednesday his surprise announcement about running in the 2018 election from the UAE where he has been based with his family.

Shafik's family said he was taken from their home on Saturday and flown by private plane back to Cairo. A Reuters witness said Egyptian authorities escorted him in a convoy from the airport.

"We know nothing about him since he left home yesterday," Shafik's daughter has said. "If he was deported he should have been able to go home by now, not just disappear. We consider him kidnapped."

The family and their lawyer said they planned to file complaints with the prosecutor's office around Shafik's whereabouts.

"I call on the Egyptian authorities ... to allow me to meet him to check on him and confirm his arrival to Egypt," lawyer Dina Adly Hussein said in a statement on her Facebook page.

UAE authorities claim he left the Emirates without giving any details about why Egypt's foreign ministry said it was not responsible for the case.

An official source at the interior ministry said: "We do not know anything about Shafik. We did not arrest him and we did not receive any requests from the prosecution to arrest him or bring him back."