Judges Club President Ahmed al-Zend on Wednesday appealed to prosecutors to return to work, confirming that Prosecutor General Talaat Abdallah asked for time to think about quitting.
Prosecutors and judges have been demanding his resignation.
Zend and some Judges Clubs heads from different governorates paid a visit to Abdallah in his office in downtown Cairo Wednesday.
He added that the joint statement issued by the Supreme Judicial Council and the heads of the Judges Clubs says the relationship between all judges is based on mutual understanding, cooperation and respect. “I ask the prosecutor general to heed these principles,” he said.
He also said the General Assembly of Egypt's Judges has postponed its meeting until the outcome of the ongoing efforts between the Judges Club and the Supreme Judicial Council to achieve the judges' demands.
“Judges do not like to suspend their work,” he said. “But there was no other way in the face of the infringement the judicial authority.”
“If the prosecutor general resigns and is afterwards nominated by the Supreme Judicial Council in the coming years, the judges will welcome him,” he said.
He also said former Prosecutor General Abdel Meguid Mahmoud was unjustly removed from office.
Earlier today, the Supreme Judicial Council and the Judges Club issued a joint statement on Wednesday calling on Abdallah to resign and return to his work as a judge.
Last Thursday, Abdallah withdrew the resignation he had submitted to the SJC a few days before.
In a statement after the meeting, Yasser Hassan, the spokesperson for the prosecutor general, said that Abdallah will stay in his post for four years. Egypt’s new Constitution stipulates that the prosecutor general’s tenure is limited to four years.
Abdallah, who was appointed by President Mohamed Morsy in November in a constitutional decree, initally stepped down after hundreds of members of the prosecution rallied before his office calling for his resignation.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
