EGYPT PM EDGES CLOSER TO FORMING CABINET

       Cairo, 6 Ramadan 1434/14 July 2013 (MINA) – Egypt’s new prime minister Hazem al-Beblawi edged closer to forming a cabinet on Saturday as supporters of ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi vowed to keep fighting for his reinstatement with further protests.

      Beblawi, who was appointed on Tuesday, in comments carried by the state-owned Akhbar al-Youm newspaper, said that he would hold talks with the candidates for ministerial posts on Saturday and Sunday, the Modern Ghana quoted by Mi’raj News Agency (MINA) as reporting. 

      “The new cabinet’s top priorities will be to restore security, ensure the flow of goods and services and prepare for parliamentary and presidential elections,” Beblawi said.

     Beblawi is working according to a roadmap drafted by the military which overthrew Morsi on July 3 after millions took to the streets calling on him to step down.

     Morsi, the country’s first freely elected president, was accused of concentrating power in the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood, sending the economy into freefall and failing to protect minorities.

      But his supporters argue that his removal from power was a flagrant violation of democratic principles and tens of thousands have taken to the streets to demand his reinstatment.

     “There will be another mass protest on Monday,” a Muslim Brotherhood spokesman said on Saturday, a day after tens of thousands of Morsi’s supporters rallied in Cairo.

     Protesters are also expected to march on Monday to the Cairo headquarters of the elite Republican Guard, scene of deadly clashes last week, the spokesman, Tareq al-Morsi, said.

     “It will be peaceful,” he told AFP.

     On Friday, rival demonstrators rallied in the capital, but while there had been fears of fresh violence, the evening passed off peacefully.

     Tens of thousands of Islamist protesters gathered outside the Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque in Cairo’s Nasr City to pray and break their fast together on the first weekend of the holy month of Ramadan.

      In Cairo’s Tahrir Square and outside the Ittihadiya presidential palace hundreds of Morsi opponents sat down for their own iftar meals.

      Morsi supporters have been camping outside the mosque, where many leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood have been holed up, some wanted by authorities.

      “We will continue to resist,” key Islamist leader Safwat Hegazi told Friday’s crowd.

      US President Barack Obama discussed the crisis in a phone call with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia on Friday, a White House statement said.

    Obama expressed “serious concern” about the violence since Morsi’s overthrow and underscored the need to return to a democratically elected civilian government.

       King Abdullah was the first foreign head of state to congratulate Egypt’s interim president Adly Mansour, hours after he was named to replace Morsi.

      Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab governments have also pledged $12 billion in assistance to shore up the faltering economy.

       The interim authorities have been pressing ahead with forming a civilian administration but the Muslim Brotherhood has refused offers to join it.

      In the worst single incident of the recent violence, clashes outside the Republican Guard headquarters on Monday killed 53 people, mostly Morsi supporters. The Brotherhood accuses the army of “massacring” its activists.

      Police are hunting Brotherhood chief Mohammed Badie and other senior leaders suspected of inciting violence, after arrest warrants were issued on Wednesday.

      The military-appointed caretaker president has set a timetable for elections by early next year but Morsi opponents and supporters alike have criticised the interim charter he issued on Monday to replace the Islamist-drafted constitution. (T/P09/E1).

Mi’raj News Agency (MINA).