Washington Post: "Egypt is between Russia and Saudi Arabia"

The Washington Post published today an article titled "Egypt in between Russia and Saudi Arabia," in which it writes about tensions between Muscow  and Riyadh, as a result of which Cairo is suffering. The president of Egypt, who hopes to have friendly relations with Russia, was faced with opposition from Saudi Arabia, which accuses Russia of a hypocritical foreign policy in relation to the problems of the Middle East.

Egypt and Saudi Arabia are important allies, who jointly oppose the intervention in Yemen. But for Riyadh, Washington is an even more important ally, though relations with Moscow remain pretty cool since the time Stalin closed the embassy of the Soviet Union in Saudi Arabia in 1938. After the collapse of the Soviet Union diplomatic relations were restored, but in the last few years the iron political decision of  Putin to support the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria has led to disagreements between the two countries. In addition, a significant factor in the development of the conflict is the low price of oil, which is being used by Saudi Arabia to harm Russia's economy.

Meanwhile, relations between Russia and Egypt are having a heyday. Economic and trade relations, as well as mutual agreement on a number of diplomatic issues, contribute to the partnership between the two countries. At the same time, the partnership of Cairo and Washington is not on the same level as with Russia. But do not forget that today Egypt and Saudi Arabia are powerful tools of influence in the Middle East, which is so necessary to the USA. Of course, Egypt does not want to participate in any of the Western interventions, but we should take into account the fact that Saudi Arabia has provided strong financial support to Cairo for many years and in this respect, Egypt feels obliged to Riyadh. Whether this will lead to a deterioration in relations with Russia remains unknown, but Egypt is not ready to abandon its partnership with Putin.

The Turkish publication the Daily Sabah writes today about the transition to trading with Russia in national currencies. Turkey and Russia are ready to use their national currencies for the development of large-scale joint investment projects, which may be the next step in strengthening relations between the two countries.

The plan of both countries is to increase annual goods turnover to $100 billion by 2020. Russian-Turkish relations are gaining momentum due to large-scale development and new economic solutions, which allow the two countries to build capacity and to occupy a leading position in the global market. In addition, the partnership in the field of energy resources is forcing Western countries to reconsider their attitudes to both Russia and Turkey and to recognize their obvious advantage.

The Wall Street Journal says that a nuclear deal will not improve relations between Iran and the United States. After so many years of diplomatic disagreements even signing an agreement on Iran's nuclear program will not radically change the position of the two countries. Of course, if the sanctions are lifted the Iranian economy will have access to significant financial assets, which are currently frozen in foreign banks. Iran's oil exports will almost double, and Iranian banks and companies will again have access to the international banking system.

However, the fairly tough position of the leaders of Iran allows the country to carry out economic reforms without international involvement, although imports are very necessary for Iran at the moment. If the sanctions are still not be cancelled and the negotiations fail, the Iranian population’s disappointment will be huge. But even if an agreement is signed, the differences between Iran and the United States over the past 40 years will not be eliminated in one day. Even though they have common interests in the fight against ISIS. Ayatollah Khamenei makes no secret of his hostility towards Israel, and how this will be go down with the US remains unknown. An agreement that Iran's nuclear program is peaceful in nature would be beneficial to the entire world community, but the principled positions of Washington and Tehran may aggravate the prevailing situation today.