Turkiye-Egypt ties date back to 1925, which have been marked by a history of cooperation as well as confrontation which saw an all-time low in 2013, when diplomatic relations were severed due to Turkiye’s public denunciation of the ousting of former President Mohamed Morsi by the then Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The Turkish Prime Minister’s statements about the coup d’état in Egypt against the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood, catalyzed a sequence of inflammatory media exchanges. These exchanges culminated in the mutual recall of diplomatic envoys, thus commencing a protracted ten-year period of diplomatic estrangement. Diplomatic ties were restored in 2023 and both countries began their journey to mend ties on multiple levels.
Turkiye has adopted a conscious approach to revisit and mend ties with the region – in the hope of going back to a time where it had ‘zero problems’ with neighbors. In this regard, Turkiye has been gradually working on improving ties with countries like the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Egypt as well. Ankara’s diplomatic pivot coincides with a weak economy and also apprehensions about a weakening position in the region. Cordial relations in the region can have several benefits, including those of having investments from prosperous states like Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
