Hague calls for in inclusive political process in Egypt

UK Foreign Secretary William Hague Wednesday stressed that his country is not taking sides in Egypt and called for an inclusive political process to resolve the crisis. "We are meeting to discuss the situation in Egypt which has caused such grave concern in Britain and the whole of Europe. In the view of the British government there are three clear principles that should guide us on Egypt," he told reporters ahead of an EU foreign ministers emergency meeting on Egypt in Brussels. "The first is that we support democratic institutions and their creation in Egypt, we do not pick sides, we do not support individuals or parties, this means we want to see an inclusive political process in Egypt and it means we condemn disproportionate acts of the security forces in Egypt, we also condemn some of the terrible acts of violence that have been carried out by those opposed to the authorities such as the attacks on churches or hospitals, such actions do not win support for the Muslim Brotherhood or anybody working with them anywhere in the world," he said. "The second principle is to promote the political dialogue in Egypt, European countries in the EU tried to do that unsuccessfully before recent events, we have to leave the door open to doing that in the future because Egypt needs such a successful dialogue," he noted. The third , Hague said, "is that we must keep faithful to the majority of the people of Egypt who want a stable and democratic and prosperous country for themselves, this means we must not do anything that hurts them or that cuts off support to them. I hope these principles will be able to guide us today and we will agree on those things." He continued that "Saudi Arabia is giving a lot of support to Egypt, we should not do things against the people of Egypt, we must keep faith with the majority of the people of Egypt." "In the case of the UK, we have stopped our military assistance and we have revoked our export licences where the goods being exported could be used for internal repression, there are certain actions that we should take, but as for economic assistance that helps directly the people of Egypt that may be a different matter, we have to look at that in accordance to the principles of our association and partnership with Egypt," he added.