"Egyptian police have arrested four Al-Jazeera journalists, including the TV network's Cairo bureau chief, Mohamed Fadel Fahmy, and a former BBC correspondent, Peter Greste.
The interior ministry accused the journalists of holding "illegal meetings" with the banned Muslim Brotherhood, which was declared last week to be a terrorist organisation.
The military-backed interim government has launched a crackdown on the movement ever since the army ousted the Brotherhood-backed president, Mohammed Morsi, from power in July.
An interior ministry statement accused the journalists of broadcasting "false news" that was "damaging to national security". It said that cameras, recordings and other material had been seized from rooms at a Cairo hotel.
The journalists were said to possess materials that promoted "incitement", such as information about campus strikes by students who support the Brotherhood.
The two other arrested Al-Jazeera staff were identified by the network as Baher Mohamed and cameraman Mohamed Fawzy. All four have been in custody since Sunday evening.
Greste, an Australian, is an experienced foreign correspondent who previously worked for Reuters, CNN and the BBC. He won a Peabody Award in 2012 for a BBC Panorama documentary on Somalia.
Egypt's media have been under pressure since Morsi's overthrow. Several Islamist channels were closed down in the summer and their journalists were temporarily detained."
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