Georgieva made the comments during her opening remarks on Wednesday at the annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank Group, which licked off on Monday.

Georgieva explained that the economic conditions in Egypt are getting worse amid ongoing overlapping crises, including the war in Ukraine, the already existing impacts of COVID, and rising commodity prices.

She added that Egypt needs to keep going on its reform path to preserve the gains of its first wave of reforms.

“We had a very successful experience with Egypt in previous programmes. The new programme will focus to protect the country’s economy against the ongoing setbacks caused by the war in Ukraine and to insure a vital social protection in the country,” Georgieva said.

On a global level, Georgieva said that the Ukraine war coming on the heels of the pandemic “is like being hit by another storm before we have recovered from the last one.”

“The result is a massive setback for the global recovery. Yesterday, we reduced our global growth forecast to 3.6 percent for both this year and 2023 — with downgrades for 143 countries. This is caused largely by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the shock waves it has sent around the world.”

She added that the war has accelerated inflation and increased food and fuel prices, which represent a clear and present danger for many countries.

“Financial tightening, high debt, and frequent, wide-ranging lockdowns in China—causing further bottlenecks in global supply chains—are additional dark clouds weighing on the global economy,” she further expounded.

During the event, Georgieva launched the IMF’s Global Policy Agenda, which analyses the implications of the crises the world is facing and also offers a way forward in terms of an immediate response, and longer-term efforts to boost economies’ resilience.

“Our immediate hope must be for the war to end—that would have the single most positive effect on the global recovery right now,” Georgieva said.