Egypt’s FM Visits Syria, Set To Travel to Turkey

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry visited Damascus on Monday morning, the first visit by an Egyptian official to Syria since 2011. The visit is another step in the normalization between Syria and Arab states in the region since the start of Syria’s civil war. Sameh Shoukry met with Syrian President Bashar Assad shortly after his arrival. Shoukry was scheduled to travel from Syria to Turkey to show his support for the two countries hard hit by the February 6 earthquake and its aftershocks.

Shoukry’s visit to Syria comes a day after the heads of the Iraqi, Jordanian, Palestinian, Libyan, Egyptian and Emirati houses of representatives, as well as representatives from Oman and Lebanon, traveled to Syria as part of a delegation from the Arab Inter-Parliamentary Union.