Egypt shuts website, arrests its editor

CAIRO — Egyptian authorities have arrested the editor of an independent news website for operating without a license, the latest episode in a widening crackdown on independent media, officials said Wednesday.

They said Adel Sabri was arrested late Tuesday and taken to a Cairo police station, while the offices of the Masr al-Arabia website were shuttered. Prosecutors were questioning Sabri on Wednesday, they said.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

The arrest came a day after President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi won a second, four-year term in office, with 97 percent of the vote in last week’s election. He faced no serious competition, after a string of potentially strong candidates were arrested or withdrew under pressure, leaving a single opponent who made no effort to challenge him.

The officials said the Masr al-Arabia site was fined nearly $3,000 by the media regulatory body earlier this week for publishing an Arabic translation of a New York Times report, which said voters were offered cash, food and promises of better services in exchange for their participation.

El-Sissi, who overthrew Egypt’s first freely elected president in 2013 amid mass protests against his rule, has waged the heaviest crackdown on dissent in Egypt’s modern history. Authorities have outlawed unauthorized protests, jailed thousands of Islamists as well as several prominent secular activists, and blocked hundreds of independent websites.