29 mars 2024

France is about to sell 30 Rafales to Egypt

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Late Monday night, May 3, the spokesman for the Egyptian Ministry of Defense confirmed in a statement that France and Egypt have concluded a contract for the purchase of 30 Rafale fighter jets, manufactured by Dassault.

The investigative website Disclose reported Monday that the two countries had completed a deal on 30 Rafales worth 3.75 billion euros with payment facilities. According to the spokesperson, "The contract was concluded through a financing loan over ten years. "

For France, Egypt is its 4th client in terms of armaments. Apart from that, this country also represents for France an important ally in the fight against terrorism, and both have found a common enemy: Turkey and Libya.

According to Disclose, this arms deal between Paris and Cairo also involves two other contracts worth 200 million euros for the missile manufacturer MBDA and the equipment manufacturer Safran Electronics & Defense, one of the companies of the Safran group.

Then Disclose added that, "in the next few hours, an official Egyptian delegation is due to land in Paris before being received at Bercy to initial, on Tuesday, May 4, the financial agreement related to the mega-contract, the first since the sale, in 2015, of a batch of twenty-four Rafale aircraft. "

For some, this contract is frowned upon. Indeed, for the director of Human Rights Watch in France, Bénédicte Jeannerod, this mega-arms contract with the government of Sissi, which presides over a decades-long repression in Egypt for the eradication of the human rights community in the country, would aggravate the situation. According to her, "France is currently encouraging this repression and is complicit in these abuses. "

Ravaka Ny Aina

©Picture Source: Jours d'Afrique