The commission said candidates are limited to $1.6 million but can increase that by another $330,000 each for those making it to the second round of voting, reports Egyptian news service al-Ahram.

Candidates are given 60 minutes of free air time on national television and radio to explain their platforms. They’re barred, however, from broadcasting polling data without providing specifics about questions and survey methodology.

As first reported by National Journal, State Department counsel Harold Koh and Justice Department Deputy Assistant Attorney General Bruce Swartz had for weeks been trying to convince Interpol to dismiss as “politically motivated” Egypt’s request for so-called ‘red’ notices to arrest personnel from several nongovernmental organizations that receive U.S. funding.

Cairo’s move to seek help from the international police organization was a sharp rebuke to the U.S., which has pressed Egypt to drop criminal charges against the Washington-based National Democratic Institute, International Republican Institute, Freedom House, and International Center for Journalists.

Interpol’s headquarters in Lyon, France, announced on Monday that its office of legal affairs concluded Egypt’s request “is not in conformity with Interpol’s rules.” In a statement, Interpol referenced Article 3 of its constitution, which mandates neutrality and strictly forbids it to undertake any intervention in matters of “political, military, religious or racial character.”

Tensions between Washington and Cairo had eased on March 1 when seven American democracy workers were allowed to leave Egypt after their institutions paid some $5 million in “bail” to lift the travel ban against them. These Americans—including IRI’s Sam LaHood, son of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood—still face charges, but are not wanted for arrest in Egypt.

Just days after Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton signed off on military aid to Cairo on March 23, Egypt asked Interpol to issue the red notices for other nongovernmental workers who were not in Egypt at the time, or in some cases, who never worked there at all. Among the 12 Americans in this group are prominent figures in Washington, like Freedom House’s Charles Dunne, a former U.S. diplomat who also served on the National Security Council under President George W. Bush.

Interpol’s review also concluded that no information about the individuals in this group—which also includes two Lebanese and one Jordanian national—be maintained in its databases. Egypt had directly asked countries for help in locating and arresting the individuals in a secret alert known as a diffusion, circumventing the formal process of seeking a red notice for the NGO workers through Interpol’s headquarters.

“Following the diffusion sent by the Egyptian authorities, all 190 INTERPOL member countries were advised that a legal review of the request was being conducted, and all 190 member countries have now been updated as to the General Secretariat’s decision to refuse the Red Notice request,” Interpol said in a statement.

The Head of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will hold important talks on 2/4/2012, Barakat al-Farra Palestinian Ambassador to Egypt and permanent delegate to the Arab League said.

In statements in Cairo, Farra said the talks will tackle the latest developments on the Palestinian, the reconciliation file, efforts aimed to relieve Gaza suffering and peacemaking as well as bilateral relations.

Abbas will also lay the foundation stone of the new premises of the Palestinian embassy in New Cairo district on 2/4/2012.

More ominously, the ruling military issued a veiled threat of a crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood if the group persisted in demands to form a new government.

The warning pointed to a growing possibility of confrontation between the Brotherhood and the military, which emerged as Egypt’s two most powerful institutions since the fall of longtime authoritarian ruler Hosni Mubarak a year ago. For months, they have moved between cooperating and jostling for position.

But the Brotherhood appears to be growing in confidence over its position. The group holds nearly half the seats in parliament, making it the largest bloc — and its strength grows even more on some issues in which it is backed by the second-largest bloc, the ultraconservative Islamic Salafis.

Together they have been demanding the ouster of the military-appointed prime minister so they can form their own government. The military has staunchly refused. They have also used their strength in parliament to create a constitutional panel with an Islamist majority, giving them the strongest hand in writing the new charter.

In response to the tensions with the military, the Brotherhood’s leader, Mohammed Badie, said in comments posted on the group’s website Monday that it was “quite possible” for the Brotherhood to reverse an earlier decision not to field its own candidate in presidential elections due in May.

If the military-Brotherhood quarrel escalates, the transfer of power from the military to a civilian president — scheduled for before July 1 — could be in jeopardy. Their dispute could also hand the liberal and secular groups that engineered the 18-day uprising that toppled Mubarak an opportunity to move back to center stage after months on the side.

The independent Al-Shorouq daily said on Monday that several members of the ruling military council have expressed their disapproval of the makeup of the panel in a meeting with Brotherhood leaders. Brotherhood officials could not be reached for comment, but the report was the latest in a series published in the independent media suggesting that relations between the two sides have become so strained that a rapprochement may not be possible any time soon.

Two prominent liberal Egyptian politicians — independent lawmaker Amr Hamzawy and Christian activist Mona Makram Obeid — were the first to announce they were pulling out of the 100-member constitutional panel on Monday.

The team is to start its five-day mission with talks on Monday about the proposed loan with Freedom and Justice, the main Islamist party in parliament, which is expected to lead the country’s next government.

The fund has made a deal dependent on “broad political support” for the loan, and on Cairo’s ability to arrange other sources of finance to enable it to meet an estimated funding gap of $11bn over two years.

Abdel Hafez al Sawy, who heads the FJP’s economic committee, told the Financial Times that his party had not agreed a view on the loan but it was not opposed to borrowing from international institutions.

“We don’t know yet what is the repayment schedule and if the loan will be used to plug the deficit or to fund investment projects,” he said. “We can’t make a decision without clear and accurate information. The government has presented us with an 11-page outline of its economic programme with no details.”

Egypt has been under the rule of a military council since the ousting of Hosni Mubarak as president last year but the soldiers have promised to hand over power in July after the election of a new president.

The government which is negotiating with the IMF was appointed by the military but is expected to be replaced by one led by the FJP after the handover of power.

Analysts said securing IMF finance was crucial to averting a potential disorderly devaluation of the Egyptian pound. The country has burnt through more than half its international reserves during the past year of political turmoil. The economy shrank 0.8 per cent in 2011 and the budget deficit has grown to about 11 per cent, according to the finance ministry.

“Egypt cannot afford to not take the IMF loan,” said Angus Blair of Beltone Financial, a regional investment bank. “It would provide confidence that the international community believes in the new Egypt, whatever it is to be. This would be an important signal on the back of which global institutions such as the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development as well as western and Gulf counties could come up with help.”

The IMF agreed a loan with Egypt last year but the ruling generals decided not to proceed saying they did not want to leave a legacy of debt. However, the economic gloom has since deepened amid periodic eruptions of political violence. A succession of weak transitional governments has also proved unable to restore confidence in the economy.

“The government and parliament need to step up and come up with a coherent vision for the economy,” Mr Blair said. “Major financial institutions are concerned that parliament has not been focusing on the right conditions to maximise economic growth and fulfil the hopes of the population which expected a fundamental shift in its day to day living conditions.”

Fayza Aboul Naga, the Egyptian minister of planning and international co-operation, was quoted by local media on Sunday as saying that it was unknown when Egypt would sign a deal with the fund.

The Egyptian military doctor who performed the ‘virginity tests’ on some 17 girls in March last year has been acquitted by the courts.

Instead, the arrested man appears to have been mistaken for the al-Qaeda leader known as Saif al-Adel, two US officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence information that has not been publicly released.

Mohammed Ibrahim Makkawi was arrested on his arrival at Cairo airport from Pakistan via Dubai, Egyptian security and airport officials said.

Egypt’s military ruler Field Marshal Hussein “Tantawi has assured us they are working very diligently to resolve the NGO issue,” he told a news conference in Cairo during a visit aimed at defusing the row between the traditional allies.

“We approach the issue of the NGOs with some guarded optimism that this issue will be resolved fairly soon,” McCain said, adding that the visiting US delegation was “not making threats” but seeking “mutuality of interests.”

The timing of the report’s release suggests that the Egyptian generals have no plans to drop charges against 16 Americans, including the son of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, in a criminal case that could unravel three decades of close bilateral ties. Washington has threatened to cut Egypt’s annual $1.3 billion military aid package if the matter isn’t resolved.

Analysts say, however, that the generals may be more focused on how prosecuting the case will help them guard their domestic interests than on the fallout in relations with the United States.

The Americans are among 43 defendants who are accused of illegally receiving foreign money in a politically charged case against local and overseas-based nongovernmental organizations that have pushed for democratic reform before and since Mubarak’s ouster a year ago. Authorities raided the groups’ offices Dec. 29 and later imposed a travel ban on the accused.

The report carried by the state-run MENA service quoted Fayza Aboul Naga, the Cabinet minister who’s leading the NGO crackdown, as telling a judge in the probe that the United States and Israel wanted to hijack the Egyptian revolution by throwing cash at Western-friendly NGOs.

Aboul Naga singled out American NGOs by name, according to the report. She said the International Republican Institute, whose Egypt program director is LaHood’s son, aimed to impose the Republican Party’s agenda on Cairo. She dismissed Freedom House, another of the targeted NGOs, as doing the bidding of “a Jewish lobby” that targets nations that speak critically of U.S. policy in the Middle East.

“The events spun out of U.S. control and transformed into a revolution, which is why the United States decided at that time to work with all possible resources and tools to contain the situation and direct it toward the best interests of the U.S. and Israel as well,” Aboul Naga was quoted as saying.

MENA reported that the investigating judges on the case had found that Washington had cut economic aid to Egypt in order to fund pro-American political factions. The judges, according to the report, found that the United States had offered “huge sums” of money to Egyptian and American NGOs that “far exceeded” what those groups had received from 2005 to 2010.