INTERNATIONAL

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi will visit Qatar on Tuesday, in his first visit to the country since the 2017 Gulf rift.

Sisi is set to stay in Doha for two days, where he will meet with Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani to discuss a number of regional and international issues, a senior Qatari official told Anadolu Agency.

In 2017, Cairo, along with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, severed diplomatic, trade and travel ties with Qatar over claims that Doha supported terrorism – a charge the country has long denied.

The three-and-a-half year rift ended in January last year, with the signing of an agreement between Qatar and the blockading countries at a summit in the Al-Ula region of Saudi Arabia.

In June, the Qatari emir arrived in Cairo for the first time in seven years, during which he told Sisi his country was keen to “maximise Qatari investments in Egypt and take advantage of the vast investment opportunities available”.

Earlier this year, Cairo said the gas-rich Gulf state would be investing $5bn in Egypt.

Around 350,000 Egyptians work in Qatar and send hundreds of millions of dollars in remittances back home annually.

Egypt has been one of the countries in the Middle East and North Africa hardest hit by the Russia-Ukraine war. It is the world’s largest importer of wheat, with almost 80 percent of its supply coming from Russia and Ukraine last year.

Last month, Egypt’s central bank governor Tareq Amer resigned after the country’s currency plummeted to a near-record low, trading at $1 for over 19 Egyptian pounds.

Source: Middle East Eye