US appeals for orderly transition to democracy in Egypt

THE US has appealed for an orderly transition to lasting democracy in Egypt, even as escalating violence in the American ally threatened Middle East stability and confronted President Barack Obama with his most critical foreign policy challenge to date.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton refused to speculate on the future of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak or his teetering government. “What we don’t want,” she said, “are radical ideologies to take control of a very large and important country in the Middle East. Clinton’s comments came as the Obama administration tried to get a handle on the fast-moving situation in Egypt, a critical US friend in the long quest for peace in the Middle East. The growing fear is that a government hostile to the US could gain control of such a large and important Arab nation.

The US wants to see “real democracy” emerge in Egypt, Clinton said, “not a democracy for six months or a year and then evolving into essentially a military dictatorship or a so-called democracy that then leads to what we saw in Iran.”