Egypt's President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi in the Arab summit in Mecca, Saudi Arabia on Thursday (Photo: Egyptian Presidency)
President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi said on Thursday that the security of the Arabian Gulf is closely linked to Egypt’s national security and that the attack on Saudi and Emirati interests in the Gulf was an attack of terror.
Addressing the emergency Arab summit in Al-Safa Palace in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, the Egyptian President said that this extraordinary Arab get-together is being convened amid unprecedented serious threats that are facing Arab national security, most particularly the security of the strategic Gulf region.
"Any threat to Gulf security, and subsequently Arab national security, requires all Arab nations to take a firm, wise and decisive stand to confront it," the president said.
"Firmness is a must to deliver home a message to everyone in the world far or near; that Arabs will never accept any threat to their national security," he added saying that the Arabs will never tolerate any encroachment on any of their rights.
During his speech El-Sisi presented a four-point Egyptian vision on the way to handle the threats to Arab national security, saying that the Houthi attacks that have recently targeted Saudi oil installations, the repeated rocket-firing targeting Saudi cities and the acts of aggression targeting navigation in the UAE territorial waters are plain and clear acts of terror that should be vehemently condemned by the world community.
He stressed that these acts of terror require the world community to take action to punish their perpetrators and make sure that they are never repeated, so as to avoid putting Arab national security and international peace and security at any risk.
The president also demanded the world community shoulder its responsibilities and urged Arab nations to reactivate their counter-terrorism mechanisms and consolidate their own terror-combat capabilities.
He said tas well that these latest terrorist threats to Arab national security require the Arab nations to take quick and solid measures to develop their capabilities to be able to respond to any attempt to harm their interests.
He noted that the second point of the Egyptian vision lies in the need to address the root causes of regional instability and adopt sound crisis-management strategies while supporting Saudi Arabia and the UAE in face of any threat to their national security.
The third point is connected with the major sources of threat to regional security, El-Sisi said, noting that stability can never be achieved in the region without realising a comprehensive solution to the Palestinian problem that meets the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people, including those of having independence, ending occupation and establishing their own sovereign state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.
In addition to this, he added, clear-cut solutions must be envisaged to the crises in Syria, Libya and Yemen to enable these Arab countries to restore their unity and sovereignty and fulfill their people’s hopes to live in freedom and enjoy a decent stable life away from wars and sectarianism and from foreign interferences and harmful ambitions and hegemony and domination attempts by outside powers.
The fourth point of the vision is the need to take a firm stand against any attempts by regional and foreign powers to interfere in Arab internal affairs.
El-Sisi called for being candid and resolute in standing up to any regional or Arab party that tries to interfere in the internal affairs of any Arab country.
“Our meeting here today is meant in the first place at sending a clear message that we stand by side of our brothers in Saudi Arabia and the UAE and emphasise our determination to adopt a comprehensive Arab national security strategy,” he said.
Short link: