William Burns, US Assistant Secretary of State, is meeting today with eight representatives of civil society organizations on the sidelines of his official visit to Cairo. He aims to activate the strategic framework of the Egyptian-US dialogue. Informed sources said that the meeting is seeking to assess the human rights situation in Egypt in the framework of that dialogue, which has been agreed upon by the US Administration and the Egyptian government. They said this dialogue includes five committees, such as those on economic and trade cooperation and good governance. Bahey Eddin Hassan, director of Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS), told Al-Masry Al-Youm that immediately after Obama's speech last Thursday at Cairo University, Hillary Clinton met with nine activists and politicians. He then added that she declared he had criticized the US administration's stance and indeed its backtracking on the issue of democracy and human rights, especially when she said, at the beginning of her intervention, that the civil society has to face poverty and use modern technology to achieve development but did not refer to violations and freedoms. Hassan added that he told Mrs. Clinton that she, the US Secretary of State, was trying to avoid talking about human rights organizations and their role in achieving democracy. She then replied that Obama had addressed this issue in his speech, he pointed out. He linked between what Hillary revealed during the meeting with the formation of a framework for the strategic dialogue on US-Egypt partnership through five committees. He said he expects today's meeting to be the first step to kick off this dialogue, adding that human rights would be part of the good governance committee.
