Murnaghan Interview with Nasser Kamel, Egyptian Ambassador to the UK, 1.11.15

ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO MURNAGHAN, SKY NEWS

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Now Egypt has dismissed claims that Islamic State militants shot down a Russian plane yesterday.  More than 200 people were killed in the crash when the plane came down in Sinai.  That comes as the Egyptian President, Abel Fattah el-Sisi, is due to visit Downing Street later this week.  Talks are expected to include the threat of terrorism of course in the region.  I am joined now in the studio by the Egyptian Ambassador to the UK, Nasser Kamel, a very good morning to you, Mr Ambassador.  Let me ask you first of all about this plane crash, what is the latest information you have about it?  

NASSER KAMEL: Good morning to you.  Well to be honest I don’t  have more information than has already been circulating in the press except that of course we have a team of Russian investigators working alongside their Egyptian counterparts and we just received a team late yesterday from Airbus, French and German experts.  So Egypt’s attitude to this tragic incident is complete transparency in finding out the cause of this incident.  Of course some early investigations coming from our own investigators are pointing out to a reason that has nothing to do with terrorists.

DM: That’s exactly the point I wanted to touch on, because of course Islamic State were quite to seize on this and claim it having happened because of its actions, is that something that the Egyptian state would regard as highly unlikely given your knowledge of the strength of ISIS in Sinai?

NASSER KAMEL: I don’t want to start analysing or refuting their claims which are of course refutable by so many evidence on the ground and also technical data which points to the fact that no terrorist organisation has the capacity to target a plane at 30,000 feet.  Nevertheless our attitude and our official line is not to comment in terms of why until this international group of investigators coming from the airlines, coming from the Russian authorities, coming from Airbus itself, have determined in a very clear unequivocal manner why the plane had this tragic incident.  We have recovered the two black boxes so there is no room for error so I expect in the next few hours or days the full reason for this very tragic incident will be known to the whole world.

DM: We await that technical analysis.  President Sisi coming to the UK, what do you say to those within the UK and indeed in other parts of the world who say President Sisi overturned a democratically elected government, perhaps we shouldn’t even be talking to him and certainly we should make some very strong points about the perceived lack of democracy in your country?

NASSER KAMEL: I will tell them in relation to this tragic incident the whole world is witnessing and people claiming and being joyful about it, claiming they were downing this airplane, I would tell them that the Brotherhood which was in charge of Egypt and which was portrayed as democratically elected, their websites are joyful and …

DM: Sorry, portrayed democratic?  They clearly won a mass ballot.

NASSER KAMEL: Yes, a mass ballot is an overstatement, they hardly won 50 plus and they acted as if they had 100% of the support of the population and they moved to destroy the foundation of the democratic system by suspending a constitution so democracy does not allow you to be elected and then remain in power indefinitely and try to destroy the whole basis of the democratic system meaning a constitution and …

DM: Well people would accept that if they saw some rapid moves on behalf of the President to put Egypt back on perhaps what he would define as the true path to democracy, is that happening?

NASSER KAMEL: The Egyptian people have decided on June 30th 2013 through the civil society, a religious leader, all the head of the Egyptian opposition, decided on a road map.  This road map was very simply a constitution and this was already voted by the Egyptian people, a Presidential election and the Egyptians voted for Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to be the President for four years and last week a parliamentarian election, the first phase has been conducted successfully and the second phase is coming up in a few days so if this is not democracy I don't know what it is.  

DM: But can you see Egypt getting to a position where President Sisi will say I no longer need to have such strong executive powers?

NASSER KAMEL: I don’t want executive powers?  I did not get the question, can you repeat it.  

DM: Well that President Sisi hands over then to a civilian government once more.  

NASSER KAMEL: President Sisi is a civilian politician who has been elected in an internationally supervised election and who received an overwhelming majority of the Egyptian people.  He will definitely hand out power in four years if he loses an election and definitely will hand out power in eight years because the Egyptian constitution stipulates that we only have two terms for a Presidential candidate to handing power to a newly elected president is definitely part of the Egyptian democratic system.  

DM: Okay and tell me about the co-operation that can take place between our two countries when it comes to the issue of terror.  We have been discussing ISIS in Sinai but of course Egypt has a major influence throughout the region.

NASSER KAMEL: I was listening to Philip Hammond the day before yesterday, he was talking about the dangers and threats facing the region but also facing the UK, extremists and terrorists.   Definitely Egypt and the UK share lots of values together, we need to uphold the value of democracy, we need to make sure that extremists, even non-violent extremists, would not lead our youth into the path of violent extremism.  Egypt is fighting its own battle and when we talk about Sinai we do have a pocket in the northern tip of Sinai where some elements are operating.  The region is in strategic flux.  Why?  Because people have hijacked a great religion, a peaceful religion and made a violent cause out of it both us in the region and the UK and all our international partners who believe in peace and stability needs to work and co-operate together and of course Egypt and the UK are at the forefront of all this.

DM: Mr Ambassador, thank you very much indeed for your time, good to see you.