CAIRO (AP) --
Egypt's Interior Ministry warned supporters of ousted President
Mohammed Morsi on Saturday for a second time to abandon their protest
camps as a senior U.S. diplomat met with officials on both sides of the
country's political divide.
U.S. Deputy
Secretary of State William Burns extended his visit to Cairo by one day
so he could meet military leader Gen. Abdel-Fatah el-Sissi and the
country's prime minister on Sunday, an Egyptian Foreign Ministry
official said. A member of the pro-Morsi delegation that met Saturday
with Burns said the four delegates also would meet again with the U.S.
diplomat on Sunday for more talks.
At the core
of talks is the political future of the Muslim Brotherhood and its
Islamist allies following the July 3 coup that ousted Morsi, the
country's first freely elected president. The military coup, which
followed several days of mass protests by millions of Egyptians
demanding his ouster, also led to the dissolution of the
Islamist-dominated parliament and the suspension of an Islamist-drafted
constitution.
The Brotherhood says it is
looking for concessions before beginning talks with their rivals. Such
measures could include releasing detained Brotherhood leaders,
unfreezing the group's assets, lifting a ban on its television stations
and reigning in the use of force against its protesters.
Tarek
el-Malt, who met with Burns and is a member of the Brotherhood-allied
Wasat Party, said the delegation insisted that any initiatives for a way
out of the crisis must center on the 2012 constitution being restored.
"Morsi
would return to power in all cases," he told The Associated Press.
"Whether he spends his full term in office or delegates his power to a
national Cabinet is up for discussion."
However,
Burns and others have signaled that the West has moved on from Morsi's
presidency. Washington and others are foremost seeking stability in the
Arab world's most populous nation, and have called for the Brotherhood's
participation in the transition as a way to achieve national
reconciliation.
The trip by Burns, his second
to Cairo since the coup, comes amid heighted fears of more bloodshed
after more than 80 Morsi supporters were killed in clashes with police a
week ago. More than 280 people have been killed nationwide in political
violence since Morsi's removal.
America's No.
2 diplomat also held talks Saturday with interim Egyptian President
Adly Mansour and Vice President Mohamed ElBaradei, as did the European
Union's special envoy, Bernardino Leon.
Nevine
Malak, who attended the same meeting with Burns as el-Malt as part of a
delegation representing those against the coup, said the session was
mainly for "listening." She said the group, which includes two members
of the Brotherhood's political wing, would meet Burns again on Sunday.
"Any
solution or any initiative must include the return of the (suspended)
constitution," she told the AP. "We don't ignore the fact that there
were masses that took to the streets, but we don't ignore either that
what happened was a coup against legitimacy."
Egyptian
Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy also met Burns and said Egyptian officials
have made clear to their Western counterparts "there is no moving
back." Fahmy also said the transitional roadmap adopted by the country's
military-backed interim leaders is open to the Brotherhood for
participation.
"There have been contacts
between different figures, be they in government directly or indirectly,
and those among the Brotherhood's leaders," Fahmy told journalists. He
declined to describe those discussions as "negotiations."
Fahmy,
who served as Cairo's ambassador to Washington under autocrat Hosni
Mubarak, also said that key to the U.S. is "their interests in the
region."
"I think they do that by assessing
who's in power, who's not in power ... and how to deal with that
situation given what their interests are," he said.
While
Egyptian authorities say the political sphere is open to Morsi's
allies, they are simultaneously outlining plans to break up the two main
sit-ins where thousands of protesters still rally daily for Morsi's
return to power. Authorities plan to set up a cordon around the sites
while offering "safe passage" to those willing to leave.
In
televised remarks Saturday, Interior Ministry spokesman Hany
Abdel-Latif urged Morsi's supporters to end their protests, saying it
would help the Brotherhood's return to Egypt's political process. He
repeated the offer from the ministry, which is in charge of police, to
give a safe exit to those who abandon the sit-ins.
Meanwhile,
Al-Qaida's leader Ayman al-Zawahri condemned Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood
in a message for having "tried its best to satisfy America and the
secularists." He said that democracy is allowed only for those who agree
to "be a slave for the West's ideology, action, policy and economy."
The message's authenticity could not be independently confirmed but was
posted on a militant website late Friday commonly used by al-Qaida.
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Associated Press writer Mariam Rizk contributed to this report.
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