Cairo: Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah will pay a brief visit to Egypt on Friday in a show of support for its newly elected president, Abdul Fattah Al Sissi, two Saudi sources said on Thursday.
Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab states have provided billions of dollars in aid to Egypt to stave off economic collapse since Al Sissi, then army chief, ousted Islamist president Mohammad Mursi last year and outlawed his Muslim Brotherhood.
Like Egypt, Saudi Arabia has branded the Brotherhood a terrorist organisation, viewing its Islamist doctrines as a threat to Saudi Arabia.
Abdullah, who does not often travel due to his advanced age and health concerns, will stop off in Cairo for just a few hours on his way home from a visit to Morocco, the Saudi sources said.
The king has urged Egyptians to embrace Al Sissi and to disown the “strange chaos” of the Arab uprisings of the past few years, which toppled Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak and other autocrats in Tunisia and Libya.
