Egyptian charged with sex assault of New York hotel maid

An Egyptian man was charged on Monday with sexually assaulting a hotel maid at a luxury New York City hotel, police said.

Mahmoud Abdel-Salam Omar, 74, is accused of assaulting the maid when she delivered tissues that had been requested to room 1027 about 6 pm (2200 GMT) on Sunday at the Pierre Hotel on Manhattan's Upper East Side, police said.

An assault was reported to police on Monday morning. Omar, of Alexandria, Egypt, was arrested and charged with sexual abuse, unlawful imprisonment, forcible touching and harassment.

The arrest comes two weeks after former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn was charged with trying to rape a hotel maid at another luxury Manhattan hotel.

Strauss-Kahn, now under house arrest in multimillion dollar New York townhouse, has denied charges of a criminal sexual act, attempted rape, sexual abuse, unlawful imprisonment and forcible touching.

If convicted, Strauss-Kahn, who resigned as managing director of the International Monetary Fund after his arrest, faces up to 25 years in prison. He is due to appear in court again on June 6.