Expressing concern over the situation in Egypt where a military takeover of a democratically-elected government looked eminent, the United States today said it was closely monitoring the situation in the country.
It also noted that Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi had not done enough to address the concerns of the protestors.
"We remain very concerned about what we're seeing on the ground, and we do realise that this is an extremely tense and fast-moving situation in Egypt.
"We are monitoring it very closely, as you all know and as we've talked about in here, for the past several days and continue to believe that, of course, the Egyptian people deserve a peaceful political solution to the current crisis," State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters at her daily news conference.
Referring to the speech delivered by Morsi a day earlier, Psaki said "there was an absence of significant specific steps" in his speech.
"We had said that he must do more to be truly responsive and representative to the justified concerns expressed by the Egyptian people.
"Unfortunately, that was not a part of what he talked about in his speech," she said.
"A larger point here is that regardless of the contents of his speech, actions speak louder than words and any words that could be in a speech.
"As the President has conveyed, as the Secretary (of State) has conveyed and others have conveyed to their counterparts, it's important for President Morsi to listen to the Egyptian people and to take steps to engage with all sides," she said.
