Qatar supports Egypt government

Doha drastically changes its foreign policy towards Cairo as it joins other Persian Gulf states in supporting Egypt’s military-backed government.

In a statement issued on Tuesday following the meeting of the (Persian) Gulf Cooperation Council foreign ministers in the Qatari capital Doha, the six Arab member states, including Qatar, voiced their “full support to Egypt” and the “political program of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi”.

“We believe that a strong Egypt is in the interest of all Arabs,” said Qatar’s Foreign Minister Khalid al-Attiyah.

This is while Qatar was a staunch ally of Egypt’s former president Mohamed Morsi and severely denounced its ouster by the Egyptian military in 2013.

Doha’s condemnatory stance towards the Egyptian military garnered harsh criticism from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain which recalled their ambassadors from Doha in March to show their anger at Qatar’s foreign policy.

Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically-elected president, was ousted in July 2013 in a military coup led by Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the country’s current president and the then army commander.