Mubarak cancels controversial White House trip
Reuters reports that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is canceling his trip to the United States in order to grieve over the death of his grandson. But, like everything else about the opaque Mubarak regime, it’s not totally clear what’s going on. It was the White House that broke the news of the cancelation, and Egyptian ...
Reuters reports that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is canceling his trip to the United States in order to grieve over the death of his grandson. But, like everything else about the opaque Mubarak regime, it's not totally clear what's going on. It was the White House that broke the news of the cancelation, and Egyptian officials aren't commenting. Nor did Mubarak, who is 81 years old and is often rumored to be in poor health himself, attend his grandson's funeral yesterday.
Reuters reports that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is canceling his trip to the United States in order to grieve over the death of his grandson. But, like everything else about the opaque Mubarak regime, it’s not totally clear what’s going on. It was the White House that broke the news of the cancelation, and Egyptian officials aren’t commenting. Nor did Mubarak, who is 81 years old and is often rumored to be in poor health himself, attend his grandson’s funeral yesterday.
Although conspiracy theories are likely to proliferate rapidly in Egypt, the simplest explanation is probably the correct one here: Mubarak wants to grieve for his grandson. His visit to Washington was scheduled for May 25, which isn’t too far off. And U.S. President Barack Obama is coming to Egypt in early June, soon enough that they can conduct whatever business they need to conduct at that time. I doubt Mubarak was too concerned about what seemed to be a fairly mild groundswell of criticism of his regime.
I guess we’ll have to wait to apply the "Mubarak Test" to Obama’s human rights policies.
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