Wednesday, January 6, 2021

Lars Patrick Berg, December 17, 2020, Egypt

European Parliament, Brussels, P9 CRE-PROV(2020)12-17(4-075-0000).

Frau President.

To come to the concrete themes with which we concern ourselves today. The leadership of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights has been set free. It appears that they have been dealt with at every point in time in accordance with Egyptian law. I therefore ask myself the more general question of wherein this parliament lies the antipathy against Egypt. Will a much more stringent standard be applied to Egypt than to other countries, or is a fundamental rejection of the Egyptian state put forward here? Egypt stands opposed to the extremism which threatens us all – an extremism which also endangers the Coptic community in Egypt.

While Turkey continues to attend to instability in the Near East and beyond, Egypt is to be counted as one of the few steadfast states which is in fact opposed to Turkish expansionism. Egypt plays a decisive role in Libya and there are Egyptian forces fighting the Syrian militias smuggled in from Turkey. The Islamist extremism, which sows death and destruction worldwide, has inflicted deep wounds, quite especially in Egypt. The Moslem Brotherhood nearly forced Egypt to its knees. The Egyptian state opposes itself to all of these menaces, while at the same time it drives forward progress in the areas of economy and education for its citizens, and it forms alliances with like-minded countries so as to attain somewhat more stability in the entire region.

Yet we here conduct endless discussions so as to be able to criticize Egypt. A judicial procedure is not enough for us. We encourage the opposition to the Egyptian government, a government which acts in our interest, in the interest of our security. And this uninterrupted criticism weighs upon our relations in Cairo and is quite clearly not in our interest. We on that account must think realistically and pragmatically. Egypt is exposed to serious threats to its security due to extremism – from within as from without.

It therefore matters to us all to constructively criticize Egypt – and according to different opinions – to accompany, instead of constantly rejecting.

 

[trans: tem]