Egyptian Nobel Laureate Zewail Returns to Cairo to Join Talks
Ahmed Zewail, a Nobel Prize-winning scientist who left Egypt for the U.S. in the 1970s, arrived in Cairo last night to help negotiate the formation of a new opposition front aimed at removing President Hosni Mubarak.
Zewail, 64, met with members of the opposition as well as people affiliated with the government, Ahmed El Mosallamany, an adviser to Zewail, said in a telephone interview today. He declined to comment on whether he met former United Nations nuclear chief and fellow Nobel laureate Mohamed ElBaradei, the opposition leader who returned to Cairo on Jan. 27.
“It is time for fundamental change in Egypt, not just cosmetic alterations,” Zewail, who won the 1999 Nobel Prize for chemistry, said in a Feb. 2 column in the New York Times. “Though Egypt has seen some economic progress in recent years, the masses of the poor have been left behind, and the middle class has actually gone backward.”
Egypt’s largest opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood, today rejected talks with Mubarak after at least six protesters were killed in Cairo’s central Tahrir Square overnight. ElBaradei has also ruled out discussions.
Zewail recommended steps Egypt must take in his article published yesterday. They include forming a council of advisers to draft a new constitution, holding free elections, protecting legal independence and forming a transitional government of “national unity.” Mubarak must step down immediately, he said.
The Sixth of April Youth organization, based on the Internet, said in a statement it supported Zewail’s plans. The group said it helped organize the uprising against Mubarak’s regime and represents thousands of people who have occupied Cairo’s Tahrir Square since Jan. 28.
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