Egypt’s Ambassador in Dhaka Mahmoud Ezzat has said his country underwent ‘a peaceful transition of power, not coup’ and that Egypt was ‘safe’ for foreigners.
“Please don’t follow Al Jazeera channel much because they are exaggerating very much, they are focusing on some places which are very crowded and look very dangerous for foreigners,” the envoy said on Tuesday.
He briefed diplomatic correspondents in Dhaka about what is happening in Egypt.
“No, no danger..My family stays in Cairo and they are living their life safely and with security. Don’t believe we are in danger…some channels are exaggerating… it’s (Egypt) safe, and secure for foreigners like the Egyptians,” he said.
Egypt’s army deposed its first elected President Mohamed Morsi on July 3 after days of protest by opposition supporters, in a classic case of coup.
“Military coup means that army forces assume power. This is not the case. Army removed him from power and handed over powers to the civilian authority,” the envoy said referring to the transition that saw Adly Mansour, Chief Justice of the constitutional court, as its new President.
The Ambassador said “this has not happened by chance, this has been achieved in cooperation among all national figures including the top mosque, Al Azhar Mosque, Pope of the Captic Church and chief of the armed forces”.
“This is also the request of our people who have gathered and been demonstrating…they don’t want to see him in power because he (Morsi) failed,” the envoy said citing that about 60 percent of Egyptians wanted him to quit and early elections.
Ezzat said their army chief General Abdel Fattah Al Sisi tried to convince Morsi to hold early elections, “because of failure of his government to solve problems in Egypt including security problems and employments Prices of essential commodities went up”.
“But all discussions failed so he (army General) had to remove President Morsi from his office and hand over the power to Chief Justice of Egypt.”
He said Morsi’s election victory in 2011 was because people did not want to vote another candidate against him.
“Dr Ahmed Shafiq (another candidate) has been to some extent affiliated to Mubarak regime and people did not want to elect him. So just to avoid him, they voted Morsi.”
As Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood supporters are still on the streets, there had been violence that killed more than 50 people on Monday. Ambassador Ezzat said they id not have a clear idea about what happened but their army did not shoot those people.
He said Egypt’s friendly states ‘understood well’ about what was happening in the country.
“And they realised it’s not coup. This is just a mere transfer of power from one civilian authority to another”.
Replying to a question, he said Egypt deserved democracy. “We have shown many democratic steps before. We also have had good experience of democracy,” he said.
Source: Bd news24
