Egypt closes Iraq embassy

2005-07-08 11:14

Cairo - Egypt will temporarily shut its diplomatic mission in Iraq, and has recalled its staff there back to Cairo, an Egyptian official said on Thursday, not long after President Hosni Mubarak condemned the killing of the country's top envoy to Baghdad at the hands of Islamic militants.

Speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, the official said the remaining staff in Baghdad - six diplomats and six administrative staff - were ordered to leave Baghdad on Friday.

Saad Mohammed Ribha, the head of Iraq's diplomatic mission in Cairo, told The Associated Press that he received a phone call late on Thursday from Egypt's foreign ministry telling him that the mission would close temporarily and the staff was being recalled.

He said the ministry asked for security and extra protection for the Egyptian diplomats and staff as they left Iraq on Friday.

"We are very sorry about this decision," Ribha said. "We are as sad as they are. It (al-Sherif's killing) was a horrible act." Ribha said he informed the Iraqi foreign ministry in Baghdad about Egypt's decision.

Egyptian staff at the mission in Baghdad told The Associated Press they had not yet received any instructions from Cairo.

Al-Sherif's killing marked a dramatic escalation in a campaign to isolate Iraq diplomatically in the Arab and Muslim worlds. Earlier this week gunmen fired on senior envoys from Bahrain and Pakistan in apparent kidnap attempts. Pakistan's ambassador said he would run the Baghdad operation from Jordan until he received "further instructions from my government."

Mubarak labelled Ihab al-Sherif's killers "terrorists" and insisted Egypt would continue to support Iraq.

"This terrorist act will not deter Egypt from its firm position in support of Iraq and its people," the statement from Mubarak's office said.

Al-Sherif "lost his life at the hands of terrorism that trades in Islam but knows no nation and no religion," Mubarak said.

Mubarak's statement appeared to confirm his death, but neither he nor the Foreign Ministry said if Egyptian authorities had independent proof he had been killed.

Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa denounced the killing as a "terrorist act against one of the most distinguished Arab and Egyptian diplomats," in a statement.

Al-Qaeda in Iraq said in a posting on an Islamic militant web forum that it killed al-Sherif, who was kidnapped from a Baghdad street late on Saturday only weeks after he took up his post in the Iraqi capital. It posted a short video of the diplomat being questioned, but did not show his slaying.

Pakistan's Ambassador Mohammed Younis Khan flew to Jordan a day after his convoy was fired on in west Baghdad. Bahraini envoy Hassan Malallah al-Ansari, slightly wounded in a separate shooting, was expected to depart within a few days, but Bahraini officials said it was not known when he would return.

- AP