Egypt's president seeks talks over parliament crisis

Egypt's Islamist president said on Wednesday he wanted talks with the judiciary and political powers to defuse a crisis over him trying reinstate parliament in defiance of generals who dissolved it last month based on a court ruling.
Mohamed Mursi's statement appeared to be a call for a truce to prevent the crisis, less than two weeks into his presidency, from boiling over into open confrontation with the military council or the judges in his battle to wrest power.
It was the latest twist in a legal wrangle that masks a broader struggle for control of the Arab world's biggest nation that pits Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood against a military that was in charge for six decades and an establishment still filled with officials from the era of ousted President Hosni Mubarak.
"There will be consultations among all political forces, institutions and the supreme council of judicial authorities to find the best way out of this situation in order to overcome this stage together," Mursi's statement said.
The saga began when the Supreme Constitutional Court ruled on June 14, shortly before Mursi was elected, that the Islamist-led lower house was void and the then-ruling army dissolved it. The president recalled parliament this week but was slapped down in another court ruling hours after it convened on Tuesday.
Mursi's move had risked a showdown with the army, long used to having their man in charge. Previous presidents had all been drawn from military ranks and had for most of the time since the king was ousted in 1952 repressed the 84-year-old Brotherhood.
The United States, which hands Egypt's army a $1.3 billion subsidy each year, had urged dialogue to end the row. According to his statement, Mursi said he was "committed to the rulings of Egyptian judges and very keen to manage state powers and prevent any confrontation".
For many Egyptians, though, the stand-off threatens further uncertainty that has plagued the nation since Mubarak was toppled by mass protests in February 2011, sending the economy into a slump and tipping many deeper into poverty.
The Brotherhood also faces anger from liberals and others, frustrated by what they see as a power grab by Islamists, the biggest political beneficiaries of the uprising against Mubarak. They have accused Mursi of riding roughshod over the judiciary. Presidential spokesman Yasser Ali, in a comment on the statement, said Mursi wanted to "find a way out of the legislative vacuum caused by the dissolution of parliament".