Egypt locks up “terrorists”, but won’t say which terror group they belong to

to believe. At an annual breakfast gala in April near the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi suddenly wanted to hold talks with his downtrodden opponents. “The homeland is big enough for all of us,” he said. “Differences of opinion need not spoil it.” To show goodwill he revived a presidential pardons committee. Several thousand ordinary prisoners were freed but very few political ones. All the same, not since toppling an Islamist government in a coup in 2013 has the former general struck so conciliatory a tone.In any event, the national dialogue officially set to begin this month is unlikely to reverse Egypt’s slide into despotism. The , which ran the previous government and has the largest contingent of political prisoners, has been excluded from the talks. Opposition parties taking part are doing so to get their members freed. Hamdeen Sabahi, a moderate left-wing opposition leader, was shown on television embracing Mr Sisi after the dialogue was announced. Two days later a close comrade was freed.