NEW YORK // Egypt has summoned the US ambassador to Cairo to voice anger at a visit to a conference in Washington this week by a delegation of prominent Muslim Brotherhood members.
Sources confirmed the move to Reuters on Monday but would not say when ambassador Stephen Beecroft was called to meet Egyptian officials.
The government of Egyptian president Abdel Fattah El Sisi has long been unhappy with the US administration’s engagement with the Brotherhood movement, which Cairo has outlawed as a terrorist organisation.
But US diplomats have consistently ignored the Egyptian complaints and engaged with the full political spectrum in Egypt, including secular and religious reformists. The Obama administration sees the Brotherhood as a legitimate political group and efforts to crush them outright as having the potential to radicalise many Egyptians and destabilise the country.
“In this particular case, we made a decision not to go forward with the meeting,” State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke said on Tuesday.
The State Department declined to confirm whether Mr Beecroft was summoned, or if the summoning resulted in a previously planned meeting being cancelled with the group, who are being hosted in Washington by non-profit group, the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy.
“We will remain in contact with a variety of political and other organisations,” Mr Rathke said. “We met with this group in the past and we will remain in contact with organisations from across the political spectrum” in Egypt.
State Department officials quietly met Brotherhood members during a similar trip to Washington in January by former Egyptian parliamentarians and members of the Brotherhood-backed Freedom and Justice Party of deposed president Mohammad Morsi. The group then publicised their meetings at the State Department in a bid to demonstrate their legitimacy. Observers have said that this embarrassed the US administration and fuelled conspiracy theories in Egypt about covert support from Washington for the group.
The Brotherhood delegation in Washington this week includes Amr Darrag, a senior Egyptian leader of the group, Canada-based adviser Wael Haddara, and Maha Azzam, “who is not a Muslim Brother and chairs the Brotherhood-backed Egyptian Revolutionary Council, which calls from exile for [president] Sisi’s toppling”, according to a recent report by Eric Trager, an analyst of Egypt at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
The incident comes at a time when Washington’s relationship with Mr El Sisi’s government has improved, with Cairo increasingly seen as vital to regional security and counterterrorism efforts and stability. But there is also deep ambivalence over Mr El Sisi’s hardline policies toward the political opposition.
In March, president Barack Obama lifted the suspension of big-ticket weapons systems to Egypt, and last month his administration recommended that the US continue to send Egypt its annual US$1.3 billion (Dh4.8bn) military aid package, after certifying that Cairo was meeting its obligations to the bilateral strategic relationship and upholding its peace treaty with Israel.
“Bilateral counterterrorism cooperation is growing, and Egypt continues to provide the US military with Suez Canal privileges and overflight approvals, including in support of counter-ISIL operations,” US secretary of state John Kerry wrote in the recommendation.
But in the same report, Mr Kerry also issued a harshly critical assessment of Cairo’s suppression of political dissent and civil society, restrictions on free speech and a lack of progress with democratic reform and parliamentary elections. He refused to issue a human rights and democracy certification required by congress to lift the remaining holds on US aid.
“We continue to have frank discussions with our Egyptian counterparts about those concerns, and we focus on engaging to support the freedom of speech and assembly, due process, and an environment in which groups such as nongovernment organisations can operate freely,” Mr Rathke said.
tkhan@thenational.ae
