CAIRO, Nov. 5 (Xinhua) -- Egypt summoned the ambassadors of Italy, Germany and the Netherlands and will later summon those of Britain and Canada to strongly protest their countries' criticism of the recent detention of an Egyptian lawyer as "blatant interference" in its affairs, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Sunday.
Egypt will present an official protest against the positions of the five Western countries that Egypt considers "blatant and unacceptable interference in the Egyptian domestic affairs," Egyptian Foreign Ministry's Spokesman Ahmed Abu Zeid said in the statement.
The five Western countries have recently criticized in a statement the detention of Egyptian rights lawyer Ibrahim Metwally and the general human rights conditions in Egypt.
Abu Zeid said that Egypt conveyed a message to the three ambassadors who have already been summoned that "Egypt completely rejects the false reference in the statement to the position of NGOs in Egypt and the claims of torture in the Egyptian prisons."
He added that Egypt's Assistant Foreign Minister for European Affairs, Ihab Nasr, urged the countries of the summoned ambassadors not to pursue false information and not to act like those states that assign themselves as "guardians" of other countries.
