Michael Fallon, the Defence Secretary, was in Egypt this week for the opening of the ‘New Suez Canal’ (in fact an extension to the old Suez canal elaborately advertised), and took the opportunity to express Britain’s support for the military junta that installed itself in Egypt two years ago.
The presence of a senior member of the Cabinet at the opening ceremony is in itself a message of support for Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s regime in Egypt that probably ought not be sent, but Fallon didn’t stop there.
After praising the authorities for building ‘a modern wonder’, he announced in the largest state-owned newspaper that Britain ‘stands shoulder to shoulder’ with Egypt and pledged Britain’s intentions to keep ‘strengthening Egypt’s hand against the terrorists’.
This is a regime that, having carried out a military coup, has locked up tens of thousands of people (hundreds of whom have died there), slaughtered perhaps 1000
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