Djuric with Abdelatty: Egypt one of Serbia's closest partners in the international community

Today, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Serbia, Marko Djuric, hosted the Chief of Diplomacy of Egypt, Badr Abdelatty, in Belgrade, emphasizing that Egypt is one of Serbia's closest partners in the international community.

Djuric said it was a great pleasure and honor to host the Egyptian Foreign Minister today, with whom, he says, Serbia shares a centuries-old friendship confirmed in many good and difficult times.

"It was forged in our countries' desire to lead a sovereign and independent foreign and domestic policy and is further strengthened by the strong personal relationship between our country's President Aleksandar Vucic and the President of Egypt, Mr. Sisi. I am pleased to say that today's visit represents a significant contribution to the further enhancement of our relations, which I would most like to describe as a new golden age in the relations between Serbia and Egypt," said Djuric. He emphasized that Egypt is one of Serbia's closest partners in the international community.

"If we look at the exchange that exists between our two countries in the political sphere, namely the fact that we have concluded a strategic partnership with friendly Egypt, that we achieve close cooperation on various regional, global, and international issues, that we support each other in the international arena, and I want to publicly confirm Serbian support for the Egyptian candidate for the director of UNESCO, I can rightly say that Egypt is one of our closest partners in the international community," stated the head of Serbian diplomacy.

He highlighted the enormous potential for economic cooperation between the countries, further underlined by the fact that Serbia aims to be the fastest-growing economy in Europe by 2025.

The minister emphasized Serbia's desire to host more tourists from Egypt.

"We want to see an even greater number of Serbs going on their annual holidays to Egypt, particularly to the growing and more developed northern part of Egypt, namely the Mediterranean coast, which is becoming an increasingly attractive destination. We are impressed by the efforts Egypt is putting into implementing the Egyptian Vision 2030 plan. In this regard, I congratulated Minister Abdelatty on the achievements so far and on the opening of the new capital of Egypt, which we are confident will meet all the set goals and will represent the pride of future generations of Egypt in the way that many historical monuments already represent a global heritage of humanity, found in Egypt," said Djuric.

The head of Serbian diplomacy stated that he discussed cultural cooperation with Abdelatty.

"We want our cultural institutions to connect better in the future. I don't need to say how much historical cultural heritage the Egyptian museums possess, but we want our two intellectual, academic, and broader public to become even more familiar with our cultures. A very important point in the discussions, also with the presence of Mrs. Jagoda Lazarevic, who is nominated as the new Serbian Minister of Internal and Foreign Trade, was the exchange of delegations of our businessmen. We want to host a serious and large delegation of Egyptian businessmen in Serbia this year, we want to send another large delegation of Serbian businessmen to Egypt and make this truly a year of great leap in terms of economic exchange between our two countries, especially with the free trade agreement which will be ratified in the Serbian parliament in the coming days," Djuric declared.

According to his words, Serbia and Egypt want to work on establishing and renewing a direct flight connection and everything else that can further bond us.

"We also view some of the difficult problems in the international arena very similarly, and I do not want this conference to pass without publicly congratulating the leaders of Egypt on their efforts in achieving peace in the Middle East, on ceasing hostilities, and on stabilizing the tragic conflict. The Republic of Serbia stands firmly with these efforts of Egypt and in the coming weeks and months, we will be fully ready to send additional help to the people in Gaza with our Egyptian friends, to find solutions on how we, as a small country in Southeast Europe, can support these initiatives for peace to finally settle in this region. Once again, thank you very much for the effort on this topic. And of course, we want you to feel at home in Belgrade. We want this visit to be in a good mood and thank you for bringing the warmth of love and friendship that exists between our two countries and our two peoples to Belgrade during these winter days," concluded Djuric.

The Chief of Egyptian Diplomacy, Badr Abdelatty, stated that this visit represents the culmination of the good relations between Cairo and Egypt. "Today's visit and today's meeting with Mr. Djuric are the crowning of our good relations. We have orders from our president to continue to work on improving our relations. I believe there will be even more opportunities to strengthen bilateral cooperation in this field. There is a Committee for Military Cooperation that will meet soon. There is also a Committee for Economic, Technical, and Scientific Cooperation that will meet later this year as well, precisely to encourage and strengthen cooperation in the economic, commercial, and cultural fields," said Abdelatty.

Regarding the current situation in the world, he expressed his desire for Egypt to be the gateway through which Serbia enters the African continent.

"We want Serbia to be the entry point for Egypt's entrance into Central Europe and the Western Balkans," concluded Abdelatty.