Sisi evokes Soviet ghosts with the US

[unhappycamper]

http://atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-02-250214.html



Sisi evokes Soviet ghosts with the US
By Nicola Nasser
Feb 25, '14

The first minister-level visit in 40 years by Egyptian officials to Russia two weeks ago, a two-day trip which started on February 13 by Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy, was seen in some quarters as a breakthrough in bilateral relations. However, others say is still too premature to say that Egypt is edging away from a 35-year-old strategic alliance with the United States.

Washington has rebutted speculation that it is aggrieved over increasingly cozy Egypt-Russian relation. "Egypt is free to pursue relationships with other countries. It doesn't impact our shared interests," said State Department deputy spokeswoman, Marie Harf, on February 13. Harf invoked the US's democratic ideals, saying that it wasn't up to the United States "or Mr Putin" who should govern Egypt.

However, Pavel Felgenhauer, writing in the Eurasia Daily Monitor on February 13, described the visit as a "geopolitical shift". The article quoted Russian government sources as saying that it would "dramatically reorient international relations in the Middle East".

The People's Daily, the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, on the following day described the visit as an "historic breakthrough" in Egyptian-Russian relations and a "transformation in the strategic compass of Egyptian foreign policy from Washington to Moscow".