Jim Muir: If the allegations are true, it will be the worst scandal so far

Prosecutor Ragaa el-Arabi ordered the investigation after 10 members of parliament filed a complaint alleging that the children's organisation in Minufiya in the Nile Delta was selling body parts of children under 13 years of age to privately-run hospitals.

The members of parliament, who are from the same area, became suspicious when 25 out of a total 32 children in the home died in the past three months.

They said the children were sent to the hospitals for between 30,000 and 100,000 Egyptian pounds ($9,000 to $30,000) each for their organs to be given to wealthy transplant patients.

According to Egypt's Middle East News Agency, the minister of social affairs told parliament on Sunday that a panel set up in June to investigate the association found evidence of "financial and administrative irregularities and that the children's deaths were the result of gross negligence" on the part of the association's administrators.