By Hassan Ghoneima

Striking workers have halted all activity at Sokhna Port Friday morning.Head of Suez state security, General Adel Refaat, announced that nearly 2700 workers from DP World, the Dubai company which runs the port, were striking after negotiations with the company failed to reinstate eight of their colleagues who had their contracts terminated, and to meet other demands.

With the port closed shipping companies are looking to reroute container ships arriving from Jebel Ali and Southeast Asia to other ports in Egypt.

Sokhna Port is the southern gateway to the Suez Canal, one of the busiest commercial naval routes in the world.