Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that it “saddens him to see Egyptians in solidarity with Greek people.”
“You know our attitude towards the Egyptian people is very, very positive, that is, there is a historical relationship between the Egyptian people and the Turkish nation,” he said.
“That is why we are in an effort to regain our historical union with the Egyptian people, not as hostile brothers, but as friends,” he continued.
“As I said before, it saddens us to see the Egyptian people forced to side with the Greek people,” Erdoğan said, adding: “It makes us sad to see that Egyptians are in solidarity with Greeks.”
#Turkish President #Erdogan's zero-sum game in managing ties with #Egypt and #Greece at the same time.
Once he called Egyptian President Sisi as illegitimate, #Erdogan still refrains mentioning him in his speech while commenting on #Turkey's efforts to reset ties with Egypt. pic.twitter.com/yE7bJjMX2H
— Abdullah Bozkurt (@abdbozkurt) May 7, 2021
It is recalled that on March 12, Erdoğan made a desperate attempt to court Egypt away from Greece by claiming that “the friendship between the Egyptian and Turkish peoples is greater than the relations between the Egyptian and Greek peoples.”
Egyptian-Turkish consultations were held on Wednesday and Thursday for the first time since 2013 due to Turkey’s unapologetic support for the radical Muslim Brotherhood organisation whose origins lay in Egypt.
The two sides were set to discuss issues in a “new era of normalisation” between Egypt and Turkey, but it appears no significant steps were made.
Although Turkey officials and analysts are hailing “normalisation”, Egypt stated that it will not support Turkey in any border dispute with Greece and that it wants a maritime agreement with Ankara based on the same ones it already has with Athens and Nicosia.
Turkey is attempting to steal Greek maritime sovereign rights from Greece and Cyprus in violation of the United Nations Charter Law of the Sea, in which it is only in only 15 countries in the world to not sign – with many of those being landlocked countries.
As part of these attempts, Erdoğan has adopted the so-called Blue Homeland doctrine that aims to steal Greek maritime space.
READ MORE: Egypt signs contract to purchase 30 French-made Rafale fighter jets.
