Egypt’s interim prime minister yesterday said he does not rule out posts for the Muslim Brotherhood in his Cabinet if candidates are qualified, even as police cracked down on the Islamist group.
Hazem al-Beblawi, who was appointed on Tuesday, said in a telephone interview he was still considering the makeup of his interim government after former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi’s overthrow in a popular military coup last week.
“I don’t look at political association... If someone is named from [the Brotherhood’s] Freedom and Justice Party, if he is qualified for the post” he may be considered, Beblawi said.
Photo: AFP
“I’m taking two criteria for the next government. Efficiency and credibility,” he added.
Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood has already rejected an offer from Beblawi to join the new government, and called for a mass rally today against what it called “a bloody military coup.”
Meanwhile, an anti-Morsi camp is reported to be planning a Cairo rally to mark the Muslim holy month of Ramadan following weekly prayers today.
The rally planned in Cairo’s iconic Tahrir Square, epicenter of the 2011 uprising that toppled former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, raises the possibility of further violence following a week of bloodshed after Morsi’s ouster on July 3.
In the bloodiest incident, clashes around an army building on Monday left 53 people dead, mostly Morsi partisans.
Police were searching for the Brotherhood’s leader, Mohamed Badie, after a warrant was issued for his arrest on Wednesday, in connection with the violence.
Badie and other senior Brotherhood officials are wanted on suspicion of inciting the clashes, judicial sources said.
After a year in power through Morsi, the Brotherhood is now in tatters, with much of its leadership detained, on the run or keeping a low profile following Morsi’s overthrow.
Morsi himself is currently being held in a “safe place, for his safety,” foreign ministry spokesman Badr Abdelatty told reporters on Wednesday, adding “He is not charged with anything up till now.”
His overthrow by the military, after nationwide protests demanding his resignation, has plunged Egypt into a vortex of violence.
In the restive Sinai Peninsula, a Coptic Christian man was yesterday found decapitated, five days after he was kidnapped by gunmen, security officials and witnesses said.
Thousands of Morsi supporters on Wednesday evening joined those camped out at the Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque in Cairo’s Nasr City, to break the daily Ramadan fast.
They vowed to leave only when Morsi, the country’s first freely elected president, is reinstated.
The Brotherhood accuses the army of “massacring” its supporters in Monday’s incident, and the army says soldiers came under attack by “terrorists” and armed protesters.
The public prosecutor pressed charges on Wednesday against 200 of the 650 people it detained during the violence.
Last week Badie gave a fiery speech in which he vowed that Brotherhood activists would throng the streets in their millions until Morsi’s presidency was restored.
Mansour, appointed caretaker president by the military following Morsi’s overthrow, has set a timetable for elections by early next year.
Opponents and supporters of Morsi alike have criticized the interim charter he issued on Monday to replace the Islamist-drafted constitution, which he suspended, and to steer a transition the army has itself acknowledged will be “difficult.”
An official with one of the parties in the National Salvation Front (NSF), the main coalition formerly led by Mohamed ElBaradei, criticized Mansour’s 33-article declaration for according extensive powers to the interim president.
The Brotherhood’s demise has been applauded by three Gulf states, who quickly stepped in to help prop up Egypt’s faltering economy.
Kuwait on Wednesday pledged US$4 billion in cash, loans and fuel, with Saudi Arabia offering a total of US$5 billion and the United Arab Emirates US$3 billion.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique