World Tribune.com

U.S. seeks successor to Mubarak in Egypt, 2nd largest aid recipent

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Tuesday, January 2, 2007

WASHINGTON — The United States has been searching for a viable alternative to the aging Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Next to Israel, Egypt receives the largest amount of U.S. assistance. Israel receives $2.3 billion in U.S. military aid per year.

A House subcommittee last year spared Egypt of cuts in foreign aid for fiscal 2007. Under a bill passed by the House Foreign Operations Subcommittee on May 19, Egypt would receive $1.3 billion in military aid and $400 million in economic aid, the same as current U.S. assistance.

Diplomatic sources said the State Department and U.S. intelligence community have sought to identify those who could succeed the 78-year-old Mubarak. Mubarak has been president of Egypt since 1981, the second longest-serving current leader in the Middle East, Middle East Newsline reported.

"The State Department has been drafting scenarios in which Mubarak suddenly dies or is incapacitated," a diplomat said. "The question is who could be promoted to take over."

Despite repeated denials, Mubarak, who for decades refused to appoint a vice president, has been grooming his son, Gamal, to take over Egypt. Over the last two years, Gamal has become the most powerful politician in Egypt and has been sent on secret diplomatic missions by his father, including to the United States. Both President George Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney have met Gamal.

Egyptian sociologist Saad Eddin Ibrahim said the State Department has asked him to identify those who could succeed Mubarak. Ibrahim, regarded as Egypt's civil rights champion, has presented such names as Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif and Osama El Ghazali Harb, a former member of the ruling National Democratic Party.

The diplomatic sources said the State Department search for alternatives to Mubarak does not signal any erosion of support for his regime. They said U.S. diplomats have been concerned that any successor of Mubarak would either be openly anti-American or heavily influenced by the Muslim Brotherhood.

Over the last year, Mubarak has arrested hundreds of Brotherhood members. But the Egyptian opposition said the Bush administration, despite appeals by civil rights activists, refused to threaten Egypt to release the political prisoners. Egypt receives about $2 billion in annual U.S. aid.

On Dec. 26, Mubarak ordered parliament to revise 34 articles of the Egyptian constitution. The articles included those that limit the powers of the president. The proposed reforms, however, did not impose a limit on the number of presidential terms.

"This article must be amended to allow only two terms for the president," Wahid Al Oqsori, a member of Egypt's Arab Socialist Party who ran against Mubarak in 2005, said.


Copyright © 2007 East West Services, Inc.

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