Diplomatic mission FOREIGN Minister Ahmed Abul-Gheit is in Britain and Ireland this week for talks with senior officials on ways to improve bilateral relations. Abul-Gheit is expected to raise with his British interlocutors matters related to coordination between the two countries in combating terrorism. British sources in Cairo say London is keen on reaching new understandings for future Egyptian-British cooperation on the issue. Developments in the Palestinian territories, the situation in Iraq in the run-up to the referendum on the widely-debated constitution and the Syria-Lebanon file will also figure high on the agenda of Abul- Gheit's talks. According to Egyptian diplomats, the foreign minister is also expected to strongly criticise recent official Israeli statements suggesting that Egypt is not doing enough to control its borders with Gaza. Israeli officials have all but accused Egypt of allowing chaos to rule on the borders. Some Israeli military officers also alluded that Egypt is turning a blind eye to arms smuggling from Rafah to Gaza. In Cairo this week, Abul-Gheit strongly criticised the Israeli statements, saying he had asked for an explanation from the Israeli Foreign Ministry. Egyptian Ambassador to Tel Aviv Mohamed Assem has also asked the office of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for an explanation concerning the Israeli statements. Discussing Palestine EGYPT has conveyed a request to the international community to step up its efforts to improve the quality of life for Palestinians in Gaza and to assist the Palestinian Authority to meet the legitimate demands of its people entrenched in the Strip. Securing safe and easy-to-access passages between Gaza and the West Bank and adequate exits from Gaza were particularly highlighted by Cairo during talks held by President Hosni Mubarak with James Wolfenson, the Quartet envoy to Gaza, and US Undersecretary of State for Near East Affairs David Welch. In the region to prepare for a possible summit between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and for a Middle East visit by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice next month, Welch underlined the "important role" Egypt is playing to help Palestinians and Israelis communicate their demands and expectations. NATO call JAAP de Hoop Scheffer, NATO secretary-general, was due in Cairo yesterday for talks with officials on issues of common interest, especially those related to regional security. During his talks, Scheffer was expected to be told of the firm Egyptian stance against any direct involvement by the organisation in the on-going reform and development efforts in the country. However, Egypt, officials say, is willing to welcome technical cooperation with NATO and to encourage positive and regionally-accepted assistance in relation to developments in Palestine and Iraq. Scheffer's visit to Cairo is part of an intensive effort by NATO to strengthen its ties in the Middle East. During the past few weeks, NATO has been closely involved in talks with Saudi Arabia. Scheffer recently visited Iraq where NATO has a training mission of 165 alliance personnel. It aims to turn out 900 Iraqi officers a year. Helping the helpless TWO C-130 aircraft took off from a military base in east Cairo early on Tuesday. Loaded with tonnes of relief materials -- including pharmaceuticals, tents and blankets -- the planes were headed for Pakistan, where hundreds of thousands were in dire need of aid after the devastating earthquake that hit the country last week. A third plane loaded with tonnes of relief supplies also took off on the same day for Darfour in Sudan, as part of ongoing aid shipments that have been sent to Sudan by Egypt for over a year now. The supplies are collected by the Red Crescent Society and sent using the air forces' fleet of C-130 aircraft. Reform revolution A REPORT released by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG) think tank last week on political reform in Egypt has been quoted extensively in the national and opposition press. "Egypt needs a peaceful reform revolution says an international research organisation," cried the headline in the opposition Al-Wafd newspaper on 6 October. The daily Al-Ahram reported selectively on the document, focusing only on the ICG's criticism of the opposition. The 34-page report, titled Reforming Egypt: in search of a strategy offers an objective and thought-provoking review of the evolution of political reform since President Mubarak's decision to amend Article 76 of the constitution to allow for multi-candidate presidential elections. The 7 September presidential elections, said the ICG report, was a "false start for reform" and a "response to US pressure". If the further reforms Mubarak has promised are to be meaningful, suggested the report, they should be aimed at "recasting state-NDP relations", and above all, "enhancing parliament's powers". The opposition has an equally crucial role to play in this process according to the report which said the opposition must overcome its historical divisions. The US and others, said the ICG, should support judicial supervision of the parliamentary elections, refrain from pressing for quick "cosmetic results" and back a longer-term genuine reform process which it has failed to do thus far. More precisely, it viewed Mubarak's move to revise one article of the constitution (although it galvanised debate) as part of efforts to "neutralise external demands" rather than a response to domestic pressure. All it did was "distract attention" from the need for deeper political reform. "The outcome was a set of constitutional and legislative changes which fell far short of what was required." It only "confirmed" the ruling National Democratic Party's (NDP) domination and "determination to allow no serious opposition within the system". After this false start, the report said, it is urgent to persuade the authorities to chart a new course capable of recovering public confidence and to prepare for the "post-Mubarak transition". Reforming Egypt was also critical of the much talked about Egyptian Movement for Change, Kifaya (Enough), for remaining essentially a "protest movement" targeting Mubarak personally and rejecting the status quo "rather than providing a constructive vision of how it might be transformed". But in the short term, progress on the reform front according to the ICG hinges on next month's parliamentary elections. The election of a mere representative and pluralist People's Assembly in particular could become the "point of departure for a fresh and more serious reform project". Surprisingly, the report argued against the presence of international monitors in the upcoming vote, suggesting the Egyptian judiciary is "far better placed to oversee the elections effectively as they demonstrated in 2000". It is important, it stressed, that they be fully mandated for this role. Ghad's troubles THE CAIRO Court of Appeals on Tuesday quashed the request of Ghad Party chairman Ayman Nour who two weeks ago asked that the court panel hearing his forgery case by replaced, reports Mona El-Nahhas. Nour was also fined LE9,000. According to Amir Salem, Nour's lawyer, the ruling is final and cannot be contested. The case will therefore be referred to the same court again. Nour had contested the competence of the criminal court's panel, assigned to try him on charges of forging his party's membership applications. In a report submitted to the Court of Appeals, Nour demanded to be retried by another court panel. Together with the forgery case, which Nour described as state- fabricated, the power struggle in the ranks of Nour's liberal Ghad Party took on serious dimensions this week. Moussa Mustafa Moussa, the party's former deputy chairman who has challenged Nour's leadership along with a group of dissidents, declared on Saturday that he will field nearly 120 of the party's supporters to run in next month's parliamentary polls, at the heated constituencies, which are expected to host candidates from Nour's Ghad Party. Moussa, who claimed he was elected by party members to lead the reformation at the Ghad, decided this week to launch a new mouthpiece for the party. Abdel-Nabi Abdel-Sattar who previously worked for Nour's Al-Ghad newspaper as the mouthpiece's managing editor, was chosen by Moussa as the new publication's chief editor. Commentators believe the ruling NDP will be the only party to benefit from the current deterioration at the Ghad Party, which has been divided into two camps, two leaders and two mouthpieces. They say this is why Nour has repeatedly described Moussa's group as being state agents whose sole aim is to destroy the Ghad Party ahead of the parliamentary polls and following the relative success it achieved during last month's presidential elections.
