EU and Egypt agree to a €7.4billion deal on energy, migration
The EU chief and five European leaders visited cashstrapped Egypt on Sunday to announce a €7.4 billion financial package focussed on boosting energy trade and stemming irregular migrant flows to the 27member bloc.
The deal will include billions in credit over coming years for highly indebted Egypt, and stepping up energy sales that could help Europe “move further away from Russian gas”, said a senior European Commission official.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen — who was joined by the leaders of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Greece and Italy — met with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah alSisi ahead of the scheduled signing ceremony.
The Strategic and Comprehensive Partnership agreement includes five billion euros in loans over four years, 1.8 billion euros in investment and hundreds of millions for bilateral projects including on migrationy.
Egypt, mired in a painful economic crisis, borders warbattered Libya and the centres of two ongoing conflicts — the IsraelHamas war in the Gaza Strip and Sudan’s war between the regular armed forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
Haven for refugees
Egypt already hosts around nine million migrants and refugees, including four million Sudanese and 1.5 million Syrians, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration.
The EU official said the deal includes steps to cooperate on “security, counterterrorism cooperation and protection of borders, in particular the southern one” with Sudan.
The Gaza Strip “will not be the main focus but will be part of the discussion” in Cairo, the official added.
The delegation included three Mediterranean leaders — Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, her Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides.
The agreement follows several controversial deals the EU has sealed in northern Africa — with Libya, Tunisia and Mauritania — to stem the flow of irregular migrants across the Mediterranean Sea.