CAIRO: Egypt’s Sameh Shoukry will travel to Damascus on Monday in the first visit by an Egyptian foreign minister since Syria’s conflict erupted in 2011, according to a statement by the Egyptian foreign ministry.
Shoukry will visit Turkiye and Syria — both hit hard by a deadly earthquake on Feb. 6 — to “convey a message of solidarity from Egypt with the two countries” according to the foreign ministry statement.
Syria had been isolated by regional states over President Bashar Assad’s deadly crackdown of protests against him, with the Arab League suspending Syria’s membership in 2011 and many Arab countries pulling their envoys out of Damascus.
But Assad has benefited from an outpouring of support from Arab states following the quake, which killed more than 5,900 people across his country, according to a tally of UN and Syrian government figures.
Egypt’s President Abdul Fattah El-Sisi spoke with Assad by phone for the first time on Feb. 7 and on Sunday, a delegation of top parliamentarians from around the region — including Egypt’s parliament speaker — met Assad in Damascus.
Shoukry met his Syrian counterpart Faisal Mekdad in 2021 on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. Cairo has sent several shipments of earthquake aid to Syria in recent weeks.
Erdogan and El-Sisi met and shook hands during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar and Turkish companies earlier this month committed to $500 million in new investments in Egypt.
Egypt’s foreign minister to visit Syria, Turkiye on Monday
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Egypt’s foreign minister to visit Syria, Turkiye on Monday
- Shoukry will visit Turkiye and Syria to “convey a message of solidarity from Egypt with the two countries”
- Assad has benefited from an outpouring of support from Arab states following the quake
UN rights chief Shocked by ‘unbearable’ Darfur atrocities
- Mediation efforts have failed to produce a ceasefire, even after international outrage intensified last year with reports of mass killings, rape, and abductions during the RSF’s takeover of El-Fasher in Darfur
PORT SUDAN: Nearly three years of war have put the Sudanese people through “hell,” the UN’s rights chief said on Sunday, blasting the vast sums spent on advanced weaponry at the expense of humanitarian aid and the recruitment of child soldiers.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been gripped by a conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces that has left tens of thousands of people dead and around 11 million displaced.
Speaking in Port Sudan during his first wartime visit, UN Human Rights commissioner Volker Turk said the population had endured “horror and hell,” calling it “despicable” that funds that “should be used to alleviate the suffering of the population” are instead spent on advanced weapons, particularly drones.
More than 21 million people are facing acute food insecurity, and two-thirds of Sudan’s population is in urgent need of humanitarian aid, according to the UN.
In addition to the world’s largest hunger and displacement crisis, Sudan is also facing “the increasing militarization of society by all parties to the conflict, including through the arming of civilians and recruitment and use of children,” Turk added.
He said he had heard testimony of “unbearable” atrocities from survivors of attacks in Darfur, and warned of similar crimes unfolding in the Kordofan region — the current epicenter of the fighting.
Testimony of these atrocities must be heard by “the commanders of this conflict and those who are arming, funding and profiting from this war,” he said.
Mediation efforts have failed to produce a ceasefire, even after international outrage intensified last year with reports of mass killings, rape, and abductions during the RSF’s takeover of El-Fasher in Darfur.
“We must ensure that the perpetrators of these horrific violations face justice regardless of the affiliation,” Turk said on Sunday, adding that repeated attacks on civilian infrastructure could constitute “war crimes.”
He called on both sides to “cease intolerable attacks against civilian objects that are indispensable to the civilian population, including markets, health facilities, schools and shelters.”
Turk again warned on Sunday that crimes similar to those seen in El-Fasher could recur in volatile Kordofan, where the RSF has advanced, besieging and attacking several key cities.
Hundreds of thousands face starvation across the region, where more than 65,000 people have been displaced since October, according to the latest UN figures.
