Egypt President Abdel Fattah to be chief guest for Republic Day

New Delhi, Nov 28: Egypt President Abdel Fattah will be the chief guest at next year's Republic Day at the invitation of Prime Minister, Narendra Modi. This is the first time that the president of the Arab Republic of Egypt will be the chief guest at our Republic Day, a release by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said.

India and Egypt share warm and friendly relations with both nations having civilisational and deep-rooted people-to-people ties.

Both countries are celebrating the 75th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations this year. During India's Presidency of G-20 in 2022-23, Egypt has also been invited as a Guest Country.

Economic relations:

According to the MEA Egypt has been traditionally one of India's most important trading partners in the African continent. The India-Egypt Bilateral Trade Agreement has been in operation since March 1978 and is based on the Most Favoured Nation clause and the bilateral trade has increased more than five times in last ten years. The bilateral trade volume between the two countries had shown consecutive positive growth from 2005-06 to 2012-13, taking the trade from US$ 1.2 billion to its peak of US$ 5.45 billion. Starting from 2013-14 the trade volume gradually declined from US$ 4.95 billion to US$ 4.77 billion in 2014-15 and to US$ 3.23 billion in 2016-17, due to general economic slowdown and fall in oil prices. However, it showed positive growth in 2017-18 to reach the level of US$ 3.68 billion and further grew by 23% in 2018-19 to reach US$ 4.55 billion. The top three Indian exports during this period were: motor cars, meat & cotton yarn while the top three Indian imports were; crude petroleum, urea and anhydrous ammonia. During the period, India was Egypt's 8th largest export destination the 10th largest import source for Egypt.

Indian population:

According to data from 2019, the Indian community in Egypt numbers at around 4200, most of whom are concentrated in Cairo. There are also a small number of families in Alexandria, Port Said and Ismailia. A majority of the Indians are either employed with Indian companies or are professionals with various multinationals. The Mission provides assistance to the Indian Community Association in Egypt (ICAE) and works closely with members of the community.