Egypt's military presses President Morsi to resign

A source close to Dr Ahmed Abdel Atti, the office manager for President Mohammed Morsi, who has been kidnapped by the military council, said that Dr Abdel Atti has refused a proposal by the coup leaders to persuade Egypt’s elected president to resign from his post in return for his and other political prisoners’ release.

According to the source, a member of the military council visited the president’s office manager in his cell and asked him to persuade the president to declare his abdication from the presidency in exchange for stopping the arrests of Muslim Brotherhood officials and releasing the detained political figures. However Abdel Atti refused the proposal, stressing that he supports the legitimate president and the restoration of the people’s constitutional and legal rights that were taken away with military force.

The visit coincided with a joint statement issued yesterday by the National Alliance to Support the Legitimacy and the Freedom and Justice Party, which “affirms their full support to restoring legitimacy and their refusal to abandon the President’s right” to continue in his elected office as a basic demand of the movement.