July 2 Photo Brief: Obama heads a soccer ball, rubber ducky replicas, Palio di Siena
Obama heads a soccer ball, rubber ducky replicas in China, the Palio di Siena race in Italy and more in today’s daily brief.
- Some 781 New York City Police Academy cadets attend their graduation ceremony at the Barclays Center on July 2, 2013 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. (Andrew Burton/Getty Images)
- A worker helps a chick drink water at a chicken farm in Moca June 22, 2013. A ban by its neighbor Haiti on the importation of Dominican chickens and eggs since June 7 last year has caused a crisis in the industry, according to Dominican government sources. (Ricardo Rojas/Reuters)
- Jockey Giovanni Atzeni (R) of the Oca (Goose) parish leads the Palio race in Siena July 2, 2013. Atzeni won the Palio of Siena. (Stefano Rellandini/Reuters)
- An addax calf, born June 7, roams the enclosure at Brookfield Zoo on July 2, 2013 in Brookfield, Illinois. About 200 of the nearly-extinct addax live in North American zoos, only about 300 still survive in the wild. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
- An athlete wears a mask as he takes part in a rehearsal of the upcoming Independence Day parade in Minsk, on July 2, 2013. Belarus celebrates tomorrow Independence Day, an official holiday marking the day in 1944 when the Red Army liberated Minsk from Nazi troops during the World War II. (Viktor Drachev/AFP/Getty Images)
- A photo taken on July 1, 2013 shows a sculpture by French artist Guy Lorgeret, entitled “Retour a Betton” (“Return to Betton”), in Betton, a suburb of the western French city of Rennes. The sculpture represents people on bicycles migrating from a bank to another, claiming their freedom, like their refusal to compete. (Damien Meyer/AFP/Getty Images)
- Asha Foundation animal shelter and hospital founder, Harmesh Bhatt (unseen) poses with three Jungle Lynx kittens being nurtured at the shelter on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on July 2, 2013. The Jungle Lynx kittens, who are native to Central and Southeast Asia, were rescued from Dabhoda village of Gujarat. (Sam Panthaky/AFP/Getty Images)
- An Egyptian youth with his face painted in the colours of the national flag look over as opponents of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi protest calling for his ouster at Cairo’s landmark Tahrir Square, on July 2, 2013. (Khaled Desouki/AFP/Getty Images)
- A protester, opposing Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi, holds up Egypt’s flag during a protest demanding that Mursi resign at Tahrir Square in Cairo July 2, 2013. (Suhaib Salem/Reuters)
- A woman sprays water on spectators from a Vittel vehicle belonging to the Tour de France advertising caravan before the start of the 25 km team time-trial and fourth stage of the 100th edition of the Tour de France cycling race on July 2, 2013 around Nice, southeastern France. (Joel Saget/AFP/Getty Images)
- Afghan security forces keep watch as smoke rises from the site of an attack in Kabul, July 2, 2013. Insurgents including a suicide bomber in a truck launched an attack on Tuesday in an area in the north of the Afghan capital used by foreign firms supplying NATO forces in Afghanistan, police said, the latest in a string of raids in Kabul. (Omar Sobhani/Reuters)
- An Afghan policeman talks to a civilian standing behind a door near the site of a suicide attack in Kabul July 2, 2013. Taliban insurgents including a suicide bomber in a truck killed six people in the attack on a foreign logistics and supply company in Kabul on Tuesday. (Mohammad Ismail/Reuters)
- People set up a giant 15-meter-high inflatable rubber duck in a river in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province July 1, 2013. At least ten replicas of Dutch conceptual artist Florentijn Hofman’s creation titled “Rubber Duck”, have appeared all over China after the artist displayed his inflatable installation in Hong Kong last month, according to local media. (Stringer/Reuters)
- People walk through algae-covered seaside in Qingdao, Shandong province, July 1, 2013. (China Daily/Reuters)
- Light from the sky (C) is reflected on the railings inside a Kowloon government housing estate in Hong Kong on July 2, 2013. New government data on May 23 underlined the housing crisis in Hong Kong where it estimated more than 170,000 people live in subdivided flats in Hong Kong, doubling official figures from 2012. (Anthony Wallace/AFP/Getty Images)
- A tourist looks from a window of the Namsan tower overlooking the Seoul city skyline during rainfall on July 2, 2013. July marks the wet season for Seoul during which the city of10 million people receives some 60 percent of its annual rainfall. (Ed Jones/AFP/Getty Images
- Riders perform during the Adrenaline FMX Rush moto freestyle show in Russia’s Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, July 2, 2013. (Ilya Naymushin/Reuters)
- An employee uses a brush to clean a bronze medal manufactured for the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, at the Adamas jewellery factory in Moscow, June 28, 2013. The factory is the official medal supplier of the 2014 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games in Sochi. (Sergei Karpukhin/Reuters)
- A model presents a creation by German designer Karl Lagerfeld as part of his Haute Couture Fall Winter 2013/2014 fashion show for French fashion house Chanel in Paris July 2, 2013. (Charles Platiau/Reuters)
- Uranjargal, a leader of the Mongolian neo-Nazi group Tsagaan Khass, poses for a portrait at the group’s headquarters in Ulan Bator June 23, 2013. The group has rebranded itself as an environmentalist organization fighting pollution by foreign-owned mines, seeking legitimacy as it sends Swastika-wearing members to check mining permits. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)
- A woman with an umbrella walks in the rain along the street as she returns from the field in Lalitpur July 2, 2013. (Navesh Chitrakar/Reuters)
- A South African court ordered the return of the remains of three of Nelson Mandela’s children to his ancestral village, following a bitter family feud linked to the eventual burial site of the ailing anti-apartheid hero. A judge in the southern city of Mthatha instructed Mandela’s eldest grandson Mandla to transfer the remains to Qunu. Mandla allegedly had the graves moved to Mvezo, 18 miles away, without the rest of the family’s consent in 2011. Pictured: Makaziwe Mandela, daughter of Nelson Mandela (L) and Ndaba Mandela, grandson of Nelson Mandela (C) and Ndileka Mandela, grandaughter of Nelson Mandela (R) at the Mthatha high court on July 2, 2013. (Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images)
- President Barack Obama heads a soccer ball at Ubungo Power Plant in Dar es Salaam July 2, 2013. The ball called a “soccket ball” has internal electronics that allows it to generate and store electricity that can power small devices. (Jason Reed/Reuters)
- U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry makes a statement to the media regarding his meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Bandar Seri Begawan July 2, 2013. Kerry said he did not have substantive discussions with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden when the two held a two-hour meeting at an Asian security conference on Tuesday. (Jacquelyn Martin/Reuters)
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Egypt army plan would sideline Mursi if no deal in 24 hours
Yasmine Saleh and Asma Alsharif, Reuters
1:43 p.m. EDT, July 2, 2013
CAIRO (Reuters) – Egypt’s army has plans to push President Mohamed Mursi aside and suspend the constitution if he fails to strike a power-sharing deal with his opponents within 24 hours, military sources told Reuters on Tuesday.
Egypt’s first freely elected leader was still clinging to power with tens of thousands of people on the streets from rival factions. There were some clashes between Mursi’s Islamist supporters and those who want him forced out after only a year in office.
Military sources told Reuters that once a two-day deadline set by the head of the armed forces expires at 5 p.m. (11:00 a.m. EDT) on Wednesday, the military intended to install an interim council, composed mainly of civilians from different political groups and experienced technocrats, to run the country until an amended constitution was drafted within months.
That would be followed by a new presidential election, but parliamentary polls would be delayed until strict conditions for selecting candidates were in force, they said.
They would not say how the military intended to deal with Mursi if he refused to go quietly. He rebuffed the ultimatum on Tuesday and said he would go on working. But he was looking increasingly isolated as ministers and officials who are not members of his Muslim Brotherhood resigned.
The confrontation has pushed the most populous Arab nation closer to the brink of chaos amid a deepening economic crisis two years after the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak, raising concern in Washington, Europe and neighboring Israel.
The liberal opposition coalition has ruled out even starting negotiations with Mursi, saying they are simply waiting for the expiry of the deadline, which was set on Monday in dramatic fashion by General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the military chief-of-staff.
After that, their negotiator, former U.N. nuclear agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei, would deal directly with the military.
The military sources said the armed forces planned to open talks with the opposition National Salvation Front and other political, religious and youth organizations after the deadline.
The emerging military roadmap could be amended as a result of those consultations, they said. Among figures being considered as an interim head of state was the new president of the constitutional court, Adli Mansour.
The army blueprint closely resembles proposals for a democratic transition put forward by the NSF. The military sources said the new transition arrangements would be entirely different from the military rule that followed Mubarak’s fall.
Then, the armed forces’ council held effective power but was widely criticized by liberal and left-wing politicians for failing to enact vital economic and political reforms, and siding with the Muslim Brotherhood.
MURSI DEFIANT
In a defiant 2 a.m. statement, Mursi’s office said the president had not been consulted before the armed forces chief-of-staff set a 48-hour deadline for a power-sharing deal and would pursue his own plan for national reconciliation.
Newspapers across the political spectrum saw the military ultimatum as a turning point.
“Last 48 hours of Muslim Brotherhood rule,” the opposition daily El Watan declared. “Egypt awaits the army,” said the state-owned El Akhbar.
The president’s office said Mursi was meeting Sisi and Prime Minister Hisham Kandil for the second straight day.
Military sources said troops were preparing to deploy on the streets of Cairo and other cities to prevent clashes.
Fighting between Mursi supporters and opponents broke out on Tuesday afternoon in the Cairo suburb of Giza, in Alexandria and in the town of Qalyubia, north of Cairo, security sources said. In Alexandria, soldiers intervened to separate rival factions.
Protesters remained encamped overnight in Cairo’s central Tahrir Square and protest leaders called for another mass rally later in the day, dubbed a “Tuesday of persistence”, to try to force the president out.
Senior Muslim Brotherhood leaders branded the military ultimatum a “coup”, backed by a threat that the generals will otherwise impose their own road map for the nation.
The Brotherhood’s political wing called on supporters to stage mass counter-demonstrations to “defend constitutional legitimacy and express their refusal of any coup”, raising fears of violence. One of its leaders urged “free revolutionaries” who supported Mursi to prepare for martyrdom.
After millions protested on Sunday, Sisi delighted Mursi’s opponents by effectively ordering the president to heed the demands of the street. It took the president’s office nine hours to respond with a statement indicating he would go his own way.
“The president of the republic was not consulted about the statement issued by the armed forces,” it said. “The presidency confirms that it is going forward on its previously plotted path to promote comprehensive national reconciliation … regardless of any statements that deepen divisions between citizens.”
Describing civilian rule as a great gain from the revolution of 2011, Mursi said he would not let the clock be turned back.
He spoke to U.S. President Barack Obama by phone on Monday, stressing that Egypt was moving forward with a democratic transition. The White House said Obama encouraged him to respond to the protests and “underscored that the current crisis can only be resolved through a political process”.
RESIGNATIONS
At least six ministers who are not Brotherhood members have tendered their resignations since Sunday’s huge demonstrations, including the foreign minister, Mohamed Kamel Amr. The cabinet spokesman also resigned, the state news agency MENA said.
Kandil chaired a session of the rump cabinet without the key ministers of defense and the interior. Justice Minister Ahmed Suleiman denied reports that the government had resigned.
In another blow to the president, Egypt’s top appeals court upheld the dismissal of the prosecutor general appointed by Mursi last year – a major bugbear to the liberal opposition – and replaced him with his Mubarak-era predecessor.
Senior Brotherhood politician Mohamed El-Beltagy said that move was part of a creeping coup. He said he expected the High Committee for Elections to meet within hours to consider annulling the 2012 presidential election.
Compounding a sense of an administration disintegrating even as the president hangs on, Mursi’s military adviser, U.S.-trained former chief-of-staff General Sami Enan, also resigned.
World powers are looking on anxiously, including the United States, which has long funded the Egyptian army as a key component in the security of Washington’s ally Israel.
General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, spoke to his Egyptian counterpart on Monday. It is unclear how far the military has informed, or coordinated with, its U.S. sponsors but an Egyptian official said a coup could not succeed without U.S. approval.
The United Nations Human Rights office called on Mursi to listen to the demands of the people and engage in a “serious national dialogue” but also said: “Nothing should be done that would undermine democratic processes.”
A senior European diplomat said that if the army were to go further and remove the elected president, the international community would have no alternative but to condemn it.
Yasser El-Shimy, Egypt analyst at the International Crisis Group, said the army ultimatum had hardened positions on either side, making it very difficult to find a constitutional way out of the crisis: “Things could deteriorate very rapidly from there, either through confrontations on the street, or international sanctions,” he said.
“Mursi is calling their bluff, saying to them, ‘if you are going to do this, you will have to do it over my dead body’.”
Among Mursi’s allies are groups with militant pasts, including al-Gamaa al-Islamiya, a sometime associate of al Qaeda, whose men fought Mubarak’s security forces for years and who have warned they would not tolerate renewed military rule.
For many Egyptians, fixing the economy is key. Unrest since Mubarak fell has decimated tourism and investment and state finances are in poor shape, drained by extensive subsidies for food and fuel and struggling to provide regular supplies.
The Cairo bourse, reopening after a holiday, shot up nearly 5 percent after the army’s move.
(Reporting by Asma Alsharif, Alexander Dziadosz, Shaimaa Fayed, Maggie Fick, Alastair Macdonald, Shadia Nasralla, Tom Perry, Yasmine Saleh, Paul Taylor and Patrick Werr in Cairo and Yursi; Mohamed in Ismailia; Writing by Alastair Macdonald and Paul Taylor; Editing by Alastair Macdonald and Peter Graff)