CAIRO: Egypt will not begin studies on a second fixed-line telephone operator until mid-2008, Communications Minister Tarek Kamel said on Thursday. Kamel said prices for local calls should be reviewed before a second operator is considered. The study of the existence of a second land line operator will not happen until mid-2008, the state news agency MENA quoted Kamel as saying. Telecom Egypt, which was partly privatized late last year, currently has a monopoly on fixed-line networks in the world s most populous Arab state. Kamel also said 17 companies had recently bought the prospectus for the auction of the license to set up the country s third mobile network. Egypt s telecoms regulator launched a tender for the license in mid-February. Kamel s senior adviser, Amr Badawi, said bidders with local partners would be preferred, the MENA report said. Vodafone Egypt and Mobinil operate Egypt s two existing mobile phone networks. They had close to 13 million subscribers at the end of December. Reuters