Italy joined Britain, Germany and France in summoning the Ambassador from Egypt as international concern grew.
Italy’s FM Emma Bonino joins me now on the phone from Rome.
ANCHOR: Minister, it’s one of those situations where frankly all of you can make noise and trying to put pressure but none of you have real influence. I’m not being unkind in saying that.
EB: No, I think that you’re totally right. In the sense that at the end of the day the destiny of Egypt is in the hand of the Egyptian people and military for one side and the Muslim Brothers for the other. We are trying, with the US and others, to mediate and to call on de-escalating the violence and to call for a including government. But this mediation failed. And the reaction of the military have been frankly speaking brutal, overwhelming and inexcusable.
ANCHOR: So what do you now want to happen? The military are not going to listen to Cathy Ashton. They seem not to be listening to the US. So, what can be done?
EB: We will continue our effort to talk to them, to influence them. We are preparing a meeting of the Europeans to reassess the situation. But at the end of the day, I repeat, that is, and I would like to call on all the people of Egypt the military, the intellectuals, my friends by the way, the Muslim brothers, that had a very good word kifaya years ago.
Kifaya means enough. And I think that I appeal to them. Enough blood already and it’s time to stop and de-escalate violence. I don’t think for them and for their future that there’s not really anything they can get from more blood and more violence.
ANCHOR: Do you see that Europe can gain influence on this regard or at best will Europe Union Commission and countries be on the sidelines as this is played out between the Gulf , Saudi, US and others..and the UN?
EB: This is a multipolar world as we say. There are many actors influencing the region. We will continue our efforts we said yesterday with all the capitals by the way. We are strongly united on our efforts. But at the end of the day it’s up to the Egyptians of they want to listen or they want to rely on other so-called allies. But I strongly believe that no military dictatorship has ever opened the door to any better for anyone, no country worldwide. And it’s enough now. I think there’s still room for them to avoid a civil war, to avoid going down in more blood and more violence but, you know, with power comes responsibility. The government is in charge, the military is in charge. It’s up to them, first of all, to de-escalate violence. And it’s also up to the Muslim Brotherhood not to call for other manifestations and so on and so forth.
ANCHOR: Minister, we thank you for joining us.
