Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Egypt’s military rulers swore in a Cabinet Tuesday with a few ministers who opposed Hosni Mubarak, but exasperated the Muslim Brotherhood and other groups by keeping key portfolios chosen by the deposed leader unchanged.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International said late Monday that Egyptian prison guards in watchtowers are feared to have shot dead scores of inmates and a visitor at a prison near Cairo during unrest in the country. It called on authorities to “stop the use of lethal force against inmates.”
The Islamist Brotherhood, Egypt’s biggest political organization, said the new Cabinet showed Mubarak’s “cronies” still controlled national politics and that a call for a million man march Friday would show people’s anger and frustration.

“This new Cabinet is an illusion,” senior Brotherhood member Essam al-Erian told Reuters. “It pretends it includes real opposition but in reality this new government puts Egypt under the tutelage of the West,” he added.
“The main ministries of Defense, Justice, Interior and Foreign remain unchanged, signaling Egypt’s politics remain in the hands of Mubarak and his cronies,” Erian said.

Others involved in the movement that toppled Mubarak’s 30-year rule rejected the reshuffle put together by the military council, led by Field Marshal Mohammad Hussein Tantawi, who has been defense minister for two decades.
About 500 Egyptians protested in the capital Tuesday demanding that the military install a new government with fresh faces and lift the emergency law.

“The public demands the downfall of the government,” the protesters chanted at the revolution’s landmark Tahrir Square, with banners calling for a government of technocrats.

“We warn of the dire consequences of defying the will of the workers,” the Center for Trade Unions and Workers Services said. “The center shows its deep surprise at the government’s insistence in continuing the bad reputation of the former political regime,” it said in a statement.

The latest reshuffle brought into the Cabinet several opposition figures including Yehia al-Gamal as deputy prime minister, the Wafd party’s Mounir Abdel-Nour as tourism minister and Tagammu party’s Gowdat Abdel-Khaleq as social solidarity and social justice minister. Egypt’s new oil minister, Mamoud Latif Amer, replaced Sameh Fahmy and was previously the CEO of state-owned EGAS Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Companies.

Mohammad Abbas, a member of the Egypt Youth Coalition, described the changes as “patchwork.” He called for swift, comprehensive changes.

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton was in Cairo to offer international aid to help the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to get Egypt back to work and to secure a peaceful, orderly and swift transition of power.

“I am certainly looking at ways for us to offer support,” she said after visits by British Prime Minister David Cameron and U.S. officials, offering help to the rulers of this key American ally that has a peace treaty with Israel.
“Tomorrow in Brussels, officials will come from all over the world … to again look at what we can do in support of Egypt,” Ashton said. “We’re already discussing the capacity to give an extra billion euros in extra support.”
Meanwhile, Amnesty International said that it received from inmates at the Al-Qatta al-Gadeed Prison the names of 43 prisoners “who have been killed” inside the jail.

The statement said that 81 inmates have also been injured since unrest broke out at the prison on Jan. 29, citing lawyers representing the families of prisoners. It said a “security officer is also reported to have died.”

“The authorities must stop the use of lethal force against inmates and allow all those injured to receive medical treatment immediately,” said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa director. He called for an “independent investigation” into the incidents at the prison.

Amnesty said the bodies of some inmates from the prison “were among 115 corpses from at least four prisons brought to Zenhom morgue” in Cairo. Most of the bodies had bullet wounds in the head, neck and chest, it said quoting a forensic physician. – Reuters, with The Daily Star