CAIRO, Jun 18 (Aswat Masriya) - A judicial committee which paid a visit to a local rights group last week was mandated by a judge to look into unregistered bodies, the Social Solidarity Ministry said on Thursday.

The ministry said in a statement reported by the state news agency MENA that the visit was to "examine the work" of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS).

It denied that the committee's work reflects a crackdown on civil activity.

An investigation has been launched into CIHRS and other organisations for reasons that remain unclear, the director of CIHRS' Egypt bureau had told Aswat Masriya last week. 

Mohamed Zare' had said that the only paperwork presented by the three-member committee was a copy of the decision to launch the investigation and it showed that it included the names of other organisations.

He could not name the other organisations but said they are "well known". 

The ministry did not mention in its statement any other organisations which have been or are due to be examined by the committee. It nevertheless stressed the importance of registering under Law 84/2002 for all civil society organisations.

In July 2014, the ministry urged all domestic and international NGOs operating within Egypt to register under the said law before a deadline in November, a move that was received with much controversy in Egypt's civil society.

Several NGOs operate as law firms or nonprofit organisations to escape registration under the law, which has widely been condemned by civil society organisations for granting the government control over NGOs.

"There is no specific accusation" for which CIHRS is being investigated, Zare' said, although the committee was delegated by a judge who investigated a case on NGOs receiving foreign funding.

The case, which was opened in 2011, evolved into a trial involving 43 non-government organisation workers accused of illegally receiving foreign funding who were all found guilty by an Egyptian court in June 2013.  

A statement on the investigation CIHRS is facing, co-signed by 18 Egyptian civil society organisations last week described the "foreign funding case which is being re-opened" with Egyptian organisations as "essentially politically motivated".