Reuters reported that the world's biggest cement producer Lafarge has temporarily halted its production in Egypt because of the worsening political crisis in the country.

A spokesman told Reuters that “There is not really any economic activity in Egypt at the present time, so we have adapted our capacity to the situation. Lafarge's production activities are temporarily suspended.”

He added that the operations could restart if there is any change in the situation.

Lafarge said late on Sunday it had organised the temporary return of some 30 expatriate employees based in Cairo and their families because of the political unrest.

Lafarge entered the Egyptian market when it purchased the cement operations of Orascom Construction Industries in December 2007 for EUR 8.8 billion.

(Sourced from Reuters)