Turkish delegation to visit Egypt amid normalization process


A Turkish delegation led by Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Önal is expected to visit Cairo for diplomatic talks amid the normalization process with Egypt.

The relations between Turkey and Egypt deteriorated after Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi toppled the country’s first democratically elected president, Mohammed Morsi, in a coup after only a year in office.

Ankara has maintained its position that a democratically elected president cannot be deposed by a military coup and thus, has voiced its criticism of el-Sissi and his backers, including the West and some of Ankara’s rivals in the Gulf region.

The Egyptian government, on the other hand, urged Turkey not to intervene in an issue that it considers as the country's internal affairs. The dispute led to a deadlock in bilateral relations for many years.

Recently, however, signs of a possible reconciliation have come from both countries, particularly due to the changing dynamics in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Turkey-Greece crisis over the region’s energy resources.