Qaeda chief Zawahiri accuses US of 'plotting' Egypt Morsi ouster: audio

CAIRO: Al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri accused the US of "plotting" with the Egyptian military, secularists and Christians to overthrow Egypt president Mohamed Morsi, in an audio recording posted on militant forums.

Speaking of the July 3 military coup, Zawahiri, himself an Egyptian, said: "Crusaders and secularists and the Americanised army have converged ... with Gulf money and American plotting to topple Mohamed Morsi's government."

Zawahiri accused Egypt's Coptic Christian minority of supporting the president's ouster to attain "a Coptic state stripped from Egypt's south."

The recording contained the militant leader's first public comments on Morsi's ouster.