Tension rises between U.S., Egypt

CAIRO -- Tension is again rising between the United States and Egypt.

The increase in tension stems from U.S. disappointment with Egypt's refusal to encourage Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat to reach an agreement with Israel. Another source of tension is the current detention of a leading American-Egyptian human rights activist.

Egyptian authorities have accused Saad Eddin Ibrahim, head of the Ibn Khaldoun Center, with working for U.S. intelligence and seeking to damage Cairo's economic, military and political interests. Security sources said they have seized evidence to back up the charge that Ibrahim worked for the Pentagon and CIA.

Arab diplomatic sources said the arrest of Ibrahim has raised temperatures in Washington. They said U.S. officials and diplomats have repeatedly raised the issue in talks with senior Egyptians.

On Sunday, U.S. ambassador to Cairo Daniel Kurtzer met Egyptian Prime Minister Atef Obeid to discuss the arrest of Ibrahim. The official Middle East News Agency said the two men also discussed bilateral relations and the Middle East peace process.

Formal charges have still not been filed against Ibrahim. "The Egyptian government is fully aware of our concern and of that of the international community regarding the extended detention of Dr. Saad Ibrahim," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said. "We don't understand the decision to prolong his detention and we call upon the Egyptian government to make clear the formal charges against him or, better yet, to release him."

Boucher pointed out that in June Egypt endorsed the Warsaw Declaration at the Community of Democracies that commits governments to uphold democratic principles and practices such as freedom of expression and freedom from arbitrary arrest. The United States takes these commitments seriously and expects those countries which endorsed them to live up to the principles to which they have committed themselves," he said.

U.S. diplomatic sources said the prosecution of Ibrahim is meant to intimidate Egyptian nongovernmental organizations from being helped by Washington. The Egyptian Organization for Human Rights has already announced that it will not take foreign funds.

The tension between the United States and Egypt has been intensified by the war of words between U.S. newspapers close to the Clinton administration and the government press in Cairo.

"American officials, with President Clinton in the lead, have unmasked their faces in Camp David," writes Magdi Qutb in the government Al Messa'a newspaper. "They now stand as the Arabs's open adversary and as the prime sponsors of Israel's aggressiveness."

This was the second crisis in relations between Cairo and Washington in as many years. Last year, the administration was upset at Egypt for its refusal to normalize relations with Israel as well as its initiative to reconcile the regime in Khartoum with the Sudanese opposition. Egypt and Libya launched an initiative that U.S. officials ignored human rights violations and persecution of Christians in Sudan.

The United States is also said to oppose Egypt's tentative efforts to convene an Arab summit to discuss Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. Egyptian officials said President Hosni Mubarak has shelved such plans but on Monday Qatar Emir Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani called for a summit to discuss Palestinian positions in any future round of peace talks with Israel.

Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat has also called for an Arab summit.