Main opposition CHP team leaves for planned Egypt talks

ANKARA

CHP deputy Faruk Loğoğlu speaks to reporters ahead of Egypt visit.

Two senior high-ranking opposition lawmakers departed to Egypt yesterday for a three day visit, despite strong criticism from the government, which accused the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) of “talking to coup plotters.” 

“Our party is advocating democracy and freedoms in Turkey. We did the same thing in Iraq and will do the same in Egypt and in Washington. We will continue to do so everywhere we go,” the deputy leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) told reporters at a press conference at Parliament. Faruk Loğoğlu and Istanbul Deputy Osman Korutürk, both former ambassadors, departed for Cairo late afternoon Sept. 9 and will begin their talks on today. 

Loğoğlu said they would be meeting the Egyptian foreign minister on the visit, along with officials from the Congress Party, representatives from social democrat parties, academics, and journalists. Recalling that around 300 Turkish businessmen had nearly $2 billion worth of investments in Egypt, Loğoğlu said they would be discussing the problems that Turkish businessmen have been facing since the July 3 coup d’état. 

The government fiercely slammed the CHP for visiting Cairo, but Loğoğlu said they found these criticisms “cheap and meaningless,” adding that the CHP has never sided with coup plotters. Loğoğlu said they had not applied for a meeting with Mohamed Morsi, but they were planning to meet with representatives from the Muslim Brotherhood movement. He also said they would also raise the arrest of Metin Turan, a correspondent for the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation, and another Turkish citizen.