CAIRO: Culture minister Farouk Hosni s failure to secure UNESCO s top job will do little to shake Egypt s foreign policy, even if Cairo s grumblings are heard for a while to come, analysts said on Thursday.
A firm ally of the United States, Egypt claims a key role in the efforts for Arab-Israeli peace and is the frontman for dialogue with the Europeans through the Union for the Mediterranean.
The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization on Tuesday picked Bulgarian career diplomat Irina Bokova as its new director-general over the Egyptian candidate who was met with heavy opposition abroad amid accusations of anti-Semitism.
But neither President Hosni Mubarak nor his Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit made any public statement in reaction to the result.
Mubarak did however have private words of comfort for the culture minister who told reporters on his homecoming that the president advised him to put it all behind you.
In his lengthy political career, Hosni has often been accused of promoting anti-Semitism, in particular in 2008 when he told the Egyptian parliament: I d burn Israeli books myself if I found any in libraries in Egypt.
Hosni, who has been Egypt s culture minister for 22 years, insists his comment was made during an angry exchange with hardliners from the Muslim Brotherhood and had been taken out of context.
Despite press headlines blaming the defeat on a clash of civilizations , former Egyptian foreign minister Ahmed Maher said it was inappropriate to turn this race into a battle between Egypt and the rest of the world.
I don t think that what happened will affect Egypt s relations with other countries. We really have to turn this page, he told AFP.
Egypt s ambassador to the United States, Sameh Shukri, insisted his country would continue with its duties to resolve the crisis in the Middle East, in cooperation with the Americans, the official MENA news agency reported.
Egypt was the first Arab country to have signed a peace deal with Israel in 1979.
Cairo has also acted as a mediator in talks between the Hamas and Israel on a possible deal to end the crippling Gaza blockade, and has been overseeing efforts for reconciliation between rival Palestinian factions.
Foreign diplomats in Cairo take a more cautious approach to a possible Egyptian reaction.
The fundamentals of Egyptian foreign policy won t change, said one European diplomat, noting nonetheless that Egypt s flexibility on certain other issues could be affected.
Europeans will be watching for any signs from Cairo as they prepare for the next set of meetings of the Union for the Mediterranean, co-chaired by Egypt and France, attended by EU members, Arab Mediterranean countries and Israel.
Certain countries, like Germany, opposed Hosni s candidacy. France however had supported Hosni but finally voted against him, according to the French Le Monde newspaper.
Egyptian foreign policy will not be affected, by Hosni s defeat. said Amr El-Chobaki, a researcher with the Ahram Center for Political and Strategic studies.
But there could be some symbolic gestures of discontent in relations with other countries, particularly as Mubarak himself was so invested in his minister s campaign.
El-Chobaki hoped this episode would force Egypt to adopt serious diplomatic work over international posts and organizing prestigious conferences.
The UNESCO defeat shows that the politics of posturing affects the true influence of a country, he said.
