In Geopolitics Today - Wednesday, July 28th
Egypt Postpones Nuclear Plant Project with Russia and Taliban Courts International Partners Parallel to Doha Talks
Egypt Postpones Nuclear Plant Project with Russia
Egypt has announced a temporary halt of the El-Dabaa nuclear power plant project for a period of two years. Cairo had previously signed a contract with Rosatom, the Russian nuclear energy company, which would see to the construction of a 4.8 gigawatt nuclear plant. Under the deal, 85% of the total cost of the project ($30 billion) was to be financed via a $25 billion Russian loan.
Statements made by Karim al-Adham, the spokesperson for the Egyptian Nuclear and Radiological Regulatory Authority, reasoned that the two-year postponement of the project was due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Adham also said that construction works will be halted until regulators issue licenses after mid-2021. The delay means that the El-Dabaa nuclear plant will not be completed before the year 2030. But the sudden need for the issuance of licenses on an ongoing project indicates that the Egyptian move may be linked to other factors.
As Egypt is still embroiled in a bitter feud with neighbouring Ethiopia, the fact that Ethiopia and Russia signed a military cooperation agreement early this month is unlikely to have gone unnoticed in Cairo. Moscow and Cairo may even be playing a game of tit-for-tat, with Cairo taking part in the NATO-organised Sea Breeze naval exercises in the Black near the disputed Crimean Peninsula. In light of Egypt’s participation in these US-led naval exercises, Russia may have intended to send a strong signal to Cairo by signing a military deal with its rival Ethiopia.
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Taliban Courts International Partners Parallel to Doha Talks
There appears to be an international consensus that a negotiated settlement is the only way for the Afghan government to survive without the hard power of NATO going forward. While talks between the Afghan government and Taliban began last September, multiple meetings since then have failed to deliver an agreement between the sides. And while negotiations were ongoing, Taliban forces continued to make military gains across Afghanistan.
Now, it seems that the Taliban are making diplomatic rounds of their own in parallel to the Doha negotiation structure, with Taliban diplomats meeting high ranking officials from the region in recent weeks. Interestingly, the Taliban’s chief negotiator Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar met with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi just two days after US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman was in China for talks.
Wang apparently assured Baradar that Beijing views the Afghan Taliban as an “important military and political force in Afghanistan,” which is “expected to play an important role in the country’s peace, reconciliation and reconstruction process.” Barandar had positive assurances for Wang too, stating that the Taliban would not allow foreign forces to use Afghan territory in order to “engage in acts detrimental to China.” And the high-level meeting with Beijing was not the only high-profile player sought out by the Taliban in recent weeks. Earlier this month, the Taliban sent a delegation to Moscow which saw a similar exchange of assurances.
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