Egypt has scuttled a controversial plan to reinstall ancient granite cladding on the pyramid of Menkaure, the smallest of the three great pyramids of Giza, a committee formed by the country’s tourism minister said in a statement.

Mostafa Waziri, the secretary general of the supreme council of antiquities, announced the plan last month, declaring it would be “the project of the century”.

But news that the ancient monument could be altered quickly drew an international outcry, prompting Egypt’s antiquities authority to review the project. The pyramids are the only one of the seven wonders of the ancient world that still remain.