Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood yesterday called for mass protests for today in its campaign to reverse the army’s overthrow of the elected Islamist President, but it also gave a first sign of willingness to negotiate with its opponents.
The rallies aim to show Mohamed Morsi’s supporters are not ready to accept the new military-backed government. However, a Brotherhood official also said on Thursday that the movement had proposed a framework for talks mediated by the EU.
Sworn into office on Tuesday, the Cabinet of interim premier Hazem el-Beblawy busied itself with tackling the nation’s many woes, buying foreign wheat to replenish stocks and banking $3 billion (€2.29 billion) in badly needed aid from the United Arab Emirates.
Still stunned by the July 3 toppling of Morsi, his Muslim Brotherhood, and allies grouped in what it calls the National Alliance for Legitimacy, urged nationwide rallies today, predicting millions would take to the streets.
“To every free Egyptian man and woman: Come out against the bloody military coup,” the alliance said in a statement.
Brotherhood official Gehad el-Haddad, who represented the movement in previous EU-facilitated talks with other political groups, told Reuters that the organisation would not retreat from its demand for the reinstatement of Morsi, Egypt’s first freely elected leader.
However, signalling for the first time a formal readiness for negotiations, he said the Brotherhood had proposed through an EU envoy a framework for talks to resolve Egypt’s crisis. “We never close the door to dialogue,” Haddad said.
The EU envoy, Bernardino Leon, said the two sides remained far apart. It is hard to imagine the army letting Morsi return to power. The military has denied orchestrating a coup, saying it intervened to prevent chaos following mammoth protests on June 30 against Morsi’s much-criticised, year-long rule.
Egypt, the most populous nation in the Arab world, is a strategic hinge between the Middle East and North Africa and has long been a vital US ally in the region.
The African Union warned yesterday that Egypt risked being engulfed by civil war unless its government embraced Islamists – none of whom were included in the 33-strong Cabinet.
Egypt’s Nour Party, the country’s second-biggest Islamist group which had initially backed a military-led roadmap to guide the country to new elections, said yesterday the government would have to seek a way forward with the Muslim Brotherhood.
“I believe that those in power need to realise that increasing pressure on the Muslim Brotherhood and playing down the emotions of their supporters will lead to extremely bad results,” Nour party spokesman Nader Bakkar told Reuters TV.
At least 99 people have died in street clashes since Morsi’s downfall, more than half of them when troops fired on Islamist protesters outside a Cairo barracks on July 8.
A security source said policing would be intensified at “all important and vital facilities” today.