Egyptian Billionaire Calls for Disinvestment from Qatar
QUEST: It gets ever more complicated, Russia is denying U.S. allegations that it hacked Qatar's news agency, and in hacking planting a false story. A story indeed that helped spark the diplomatic crisis now reverberating around the Middle East. The FBI sent a team to help investigate this alleged hack. And U.S. officials believe it is an example of the Kremlin trying to cause rifts between the U.S. and various allies. OK, nine countries have now cut ties with Qatar alleging that it supports terrorism. The nine including Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE, you can see them all actually on the map behind me. The Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris is calling on his fellow businessmen to withdraw investment from the country. I asked him if such a move would only make a bad situation worse?</s>NAGUIB SAWIRIS, CHAIRMAN AND CEO, OTMT INVESTMENTS: I am not just calling on Egyptian businessmen, I am calling on all Arab businessmen who have a conscience, who don't want to be supporting a country that has been infusing terrorism and supporting all the terrorist organizations in our area. Their hands are full of load of with all the innocent people who died in Manchester and in London and in Egypt and coming from Libya and coming from Raqqa and Syria and Iraq. Their open positions are supporting countries and organizations like Hamas and Iran, so they are not even denying that. So, I'm telling everybody that enough is enough. And we should not be working with these people.</s>QUEST: But there is this huge contradiction in the accusations being made, to listen to the accusations from Saudi and from Yemen and from others, according to them as indeed the Qatari say. They seem to be accused of supporting Iran and Iraq on the one side, Syria on the other, the Muslim Brotherhood somewhere in the middle, I mean you seem contradicting yourself in the very groups that you say Qatar is supporting because those groups are fighting each other.</s>SAWIRIS: No, Richard, you keep on mentioning Saudi Arabia. This coalition is from Egypt, the Emirates, Yemen and Saudi Arabia. So, there are many other countries that -- and Bahrain. So, it is not Saudi Arabia on its own. We in Egypt have never been involved in terror, dear Emiratis are known to be the most peaceful and peace seeking nation. They have even tried to have good relations with Qatar. They are also further from being a lied at. So, I don't understand this Western view right now, you know, you guys are watching the ISIS people slaughtering the citizens in the Middle East and now they are coming to your territories and you think that we should stand there and do nothing. We need to get to the bottom of that. And we are not going to get to the bottom of that if you try to appease the country because they are just very rich.</s>QUEST: What I am saying is a dramatic and draconian way of isolating a country that is strategically important by virtue of the gas reserves it has in the role it plays in the energy industry of the globe, might not be the best way forward. That the coalition, if you don't like me using Saudi, the coalition has basically taken a sledgehammer to crack the nut.</s>SAWIRIS: No, you are saying because they have the gas and they are the most important gas producer, we should endure their financing of terror?</s>QUEST: No, that's not what I'm saying. What I am saying is you negotiate, you talk, use diplomacy, but what this has done out of the blue on a random Monday in June it has inflamed an area of the world that needed peace and serenity, not more animosity.</s>SAWIRIS: No, I don't agree with your analysis at all, you know, this area needs to stop terrorism, these people are the center of terror in our region, and they will not stop until they know that we are all against them, and they need to stop doing that.</s>QUEST: Are you looking, whether it's an overthrow or a coup or a change of government, are you looking for a new Emir, do you think?</s>SAWIRIS: No, I am not looking for a new Emir, it is not my job, it is for the country's people to decide who they want to rule them. But they should know that this regime has caused them the hatred of people who feel their hands are mixed up with blood of innocent people who are dying all around the world because they are providing support to people like Al Nusra, ISIS and all of these people.</s>QUEST: Naguib, you are far too sophisticated and savvy not to appreciate that for some people involved in this regime change in Qatar, is what it is about.</s>SAWIRIS: OK, well that is not going to be bad news if we hear it.</s>QUEST: That puts it bluntly, when we come back at the moment we will be talking about the election, the terror attacks that took place in the U.K., and factoring in what will it mean when voters go to the polls tomorrow.