Who is the winner in the Erdogan-Sisi summit?

People are on the lookout for the outcome of the historic visit of Egyptian President, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, to Ankara where he met with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, last Wednesday. The visit comes after more than 11 years of political estrangement between the two countries.

The Erdogan-Sisi summit is the second in less than a year. In the first summit, Erdogan visited the Egyptian capital, Cairo, in February of this year. That visit resulted in the announcement of establishing a high-level Strategic Cooperation Council between the two countries.

It is expected that reconciliation between Ankara and Cairo will extend to hot bilateral and regional topics, which have become more urgent for both sides, amid mutual need and desire to reap gains, since disagreements have cost the two countries heavy losses on the strategic and economic levels. 

The language of interests

The warm reception that Al-Sisi received when he arrived in Ankara sent a message that Turkiye is seriously seeking to turn a new leaf, driven by the zero problems policy adopted by Turkish diplomacy. This policy is engineered by Turkish Foreign Minister, Hakan Fidan, who previously served as head of intelligence and is fully aware of files causing tension with Cairo.

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Fidan is counting on Erdogan’s pragmatism to form new alliances that will give Ankara greater manoeuvrability in the face of regional and international challenges, and a wider area of influence in Africa from its north-eastern gate, Egypt. In addition, there are political and economic matters that necessitate moving the relationship with Egypt from hostility and rivalry to coordination, cooperation and partnership.

Erdogan has displayed the intelligence and cunning of a man who has been ruling for more than 20 years, as Prime Minister and then President of Turkiye, in the face of a stubborn General who has seized power in Egypt since the July 2013 coup which overthrew Ankara’s ally, late President Mohamed Morsi.

At some point, and under enormous pressure imposed by the course of the war on Gaza, and the tension in the Red Sea, Sudan, Libya and the Eastern Mediterranean, which are areas of influence for both countries, each party gave up its political stubbornness and overcame points of disagreement, or perhaps postponed them, moving towards more mature and balanced understandings and arrangements.

The two parties may not have yet reached the stage of being allies, but they are on the verge of major cooperation the effects of which will appear gradually and not necessarily all at once. Economic cooperation is expected to increase during the coming period, in parallel with strengthening political coordination in the region’s troubled files, according to Samir Al-Arki, a researcher in Turkish affairs.

The two countries seek to increase the volume of trade exchange between them, from about $6.6 billion to $15 billion annually over the next five years.

During the summit, Egypt and Turkiye signed 17 new Memoranda of Understanding and agreements covering the fields of industry, trade, defence, energy, health, environment, agriculture, education, tourism, housing, railways, civil aviation, information technology and communications. They also agreed on 36 basic items, including bilateral relations, trade exchange, investment exchange, regional files, conflict resolution and combating terrorism, within the joint declaration of the first meeting of the Strategic Cooperation Council between the two countries.

Political arrangements

From an economic perspective, rapprochement carries within it political and military understandings that may rise to bilateral arrangements in hot files. This may take some time, but the escalating tension in the Middle East region is sufficient to mature the coordination process between the two major powers in the region, united by the bonds of religion and history.

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 Turkiye maintains a military presence in Libya and Syria, and has a large military base in Somalia, the second largest outside its territory, and it enjoys close relations with Ethiopia. This gives Ankara broad influence on the African continent, and leverage when it comes to negotiations with Egypt.

It is likely, according to political researcher, Hamdi Al-Masry, that Cairo will work to benefit from Turkish influence in the African area, especially in the files of Somalia and the Renaissance Dam, where Turkiye would play a mediating role between Egypt and Ethiopia to resolve the dispute over filling and operating the dam.

This rapprochement may be positively reflected on the conflict in Gaza, Libya, Sudan and the Red Sea, and thus reduce tensions on the sides of the Egyptian borders which are likely to explode from all directions, according to Al-Masry.

The course of events in the region, mainly the war on Gaza, imposes itself forcefully on the interests of both sides, in light of joint efforts exerted to reach a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, reopen the Rafah land crossing and rebuild the Strip after the end of the war. This is a sensitive issue for the Turkish President, who realises the importance of the Egyptian role, given Cairo’s close relations with the parties to the conflict.

Economy emerges from the Libyan side, which is seeking political stability, reconstruction, stopping illegal immigration and ending the dispute over gas exploration areas, while opening the door to the possibility of demarcating the borders and Libya and Turkiye joining the East Mediterranean Gas Forum.

Egypt is expected to obtain Turkish-made Bayraktar drones, which is an important military deal for it. It will enhance its military arsenal, in addition to being an initiative that can lead to more bilateral cooperation in defence industries and joint production.

Mutual interests were clear in the statements made by Al-Sisi, who stressed during the joint press conference that the crises the region is going through show the importance of coordination and cooperation. Al-Sisi spoke of an existing Egyptian-Turkish consensus about the necessity of a ceasefire in Gaza, restoring security to Libya, giving priority to a political solution in Sudan, resolving the conflict in Syria and preserving the unity of Somalia.

READ: Egypt President visit to Ankara receives wide media coverage in Arab world

The opposition

On the basis of no permanent enmity and no permanent friendship in politics but rather permanent interests, the Egyptian-Turkish differences have been pushed aside, or some of them have receded from the agenda of both parties, especially with regard to the file of the Muslim Brotherhood, the group opposed to the rule of Al-Sisi and is classified by the Egyptian authorities as a terrorist organisation, while its leaders reside on Turkish territories. This is a thorny issue that Ankara seems to have managed to neutralie somewhat by imposing restrictions on the group’s movements, limiting its media discourse hostile to the Egyptian regime, and demanding that some Egyptian opposition leaders leave its territory.

A source close to the group in Turkiye revealed that Turkish authorities had issued instructions to leaders in the group to quiet down and not attack Al-Sisi or the Egyptian regime in a blatant manner on social media, according to the Al-Manassa website.

The joint declaration announced at the conclusion of the meetings of the Strategic Cooperation Council states that the two parties expressed their intention to develop cooperation in media, communications and combating misleading information.

In a post on Facebook, the Egyptian opposition writer residing in Istanbul, Jamal Sultan, rules out any Turkish mediation to resolve this issue, given the many sensitive and complicated files in which the interests of Turkiye and its people intersect with those of Egypt, such as in security, economy and politics. Therefore, it is only logical that, after more than 10 years, Turkiye would move past the events of 2013 and those that followed because the file itself is no longer a leverage for either of the two countries, according to him.

Meanwhile, former deputy editor-in-chief of Al Arabiya.net website, Farag Ismail, in a post on Facebook, says that he thinks Cairo will turn a blind eye to the presence of some Brotherhood leaders in Turkiye, as long as they do not attack its political regime.

In any case, an examination of the messages and indications sent by the summit shows an absence of the influence of the Egyptian opposition compared to how things were years ago. In return, both sides show a pragmatism that seems to have been imposed by the repercussions of the war on Gaza, and the complexities of an inflamed region in which many parties and interests overlap. This pushes each party to expand the scope of coordination and cooperation in the military, security and economic fields, and to bring Egyptian-Turkish relations to the level of a strategic alliance, which will achieve great gains for both parties.

The outcome of the Turkish-Egyptian summit remains a matter of anticipation in the near and long term, without rushing it, while taking into consideration that some issues need time to resolve due to their complications, and to find ways that avoid any possible mines down the road to reconciliation. And, while some observers are proposing a question about who is going to profit more out of this rapprochement, Erdogan or Al-Sisi, it seems this is not a precise question; the question should rather be about Turkiye or Egypt. The two presidents may leave their posts at any time, while their countries are counting on many of the results of this rapprochement which would have a large effect in the region if it stayed on its correct course.

READ: Egypt President says visit to Turkiye ‘paves way for new phase’ in relations

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.