Turkish envoy returning to Egypt; AU urges groups to back transition

CAIRO/ANKARA: Turkey’s ambassador to Egypt is returning to Cairo and a delegation from the African Union on Wednesday urged all parties in Egypt to back the political transition, a sign that acceptance of the stats quo is slowly happening.
But Cairo said its top diplomat would not go back to Ankara until Egypt feels that Turkey has stopped interfering in its internal affairs.
Both countries recalled their ambassadors last month after Turkey sharply criticized Egypt’s new leaders over the ouster of former President Muhammad Mursi.
Mursi’s ouster by the military was followed by a brutal crackdown on his supporters by security forces in Cairo on August 14. Hundreds of people were killed when police and army stormed two protest camps in the capital on that day.
Turkey’s Islamic-rooted ruling party had strongly backed Mursi — a leading figure in Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood — as an example for the Arab world of a democratically elected, pro-Islamic leader. It has criticized his July 3 ouster by Egypt’s military, while also criticizing the West for what it has deemed a weak response to the apparent coup.
Egypt, on the other hand, has accused Turkey of meddling.
“We have completed our consultations and are sending back our ambassador,” Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters.
Asked whether the decision amounted to a “normalization” of ties, Erdogan responded by saying Turkey would “reconsider” Ambassador Huseyin Avni Botsali’s position if “conditions in Egypt take a different turn.”
In Egypt, Foreign Ministry spokesman Badr Abdel-Attie said the Egyptian ambassador would not return until Turkey’s government ceased meddling in Egyptian affairs.
“The decision to withdraw the Turkish ambassador was a Turkish decision, just like his return is their business. The Egyptian position remains as it is,” Abdel-Attie said, adding that could change later.
Turkish ambassador was expected to arrive in Cairo early Thursday, an Egyptian airport official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.
In his first wide-ranging interview since being named Egypt’s interim president, Adly Mansour criticized Turkey’s leaders late Tuesday on Egyptian state television. He said Turkey should focus on “Egypt and its people and not with leaders of a certain group.”

African Union
Also on Wednesday with the visit of an African Union representatives.
“We hope that all parties meet together around the roadmap” announced by the new authorities, Alfa Omar Konari, who headed the three-member delegation that arrived in Egypt last week, told reporters.
Konari, a former president of Mali, insisted that the Muslim Brotherhood must be part of this transition, but the Islamist group refuses to enter into any dialogue with the new Egyptian government, which it considers to be “illegitimate.”
The transition plan, set up by Egypt’s interim president Adly Mansour, would see fresh parliamentary elections in the coming months, with a presidential vote possible by early next year. The Brotherhood has rejected the plan.
Konari, meanwhile, said “the decision to reconsider the suspension of Egypt (from the African Union) belongs to the Peace and Security Council” of the pan-African bloc.
Egypt’s new government had launched a diplomatic offensive to convince the Union that Mursi’s overthrow was not a “coup” after it suspended Cairo from participating in the bloc’s activities “until the restitution of constitutional order.”
AU says it is its policy to suspend any member if it undergoes an “unconstitutional” change of power.
It was the second visit by the AU delegation since Mursi’s ouster. During the present trip the panel met Egypt’s new strongman General Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, interim president Mansour and several Muslim and Christian leaders.