Egypt-Saudi relations entered a new phase of rapprochement, following the announcement of oil exports resumption from Saudi Aramco to Cairo on Wednesday.
Masry al-Youm learned that a senior Saudi official is currently visiting Cairo, to hold some important meetings with Egyptian officials.
Informed sources said that Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi also arrived Cairo on Thursday, as part of Jordanian attempts to clear the Arab atmosphere, between Saudi Arabia and Egypt, ahead of the Arab summit being held in Jordan late this month.
The sources said that the Jordanian mediation between Cairo and Riyadh is not the only one, as Kuwait is trying to remove any congestion between Egypt and Saudi Arabia before the Jordan summit. The sources did not rule out visits by some high-ranking Saudi officials to Cairo, during the next few days.
For his part, an official source within the Petroleum Ministry expected resuming pumping of petroleum product shipments from Aramco to Egypt by the end of March or the beginning of next April, at the latest, after the company announced the resumption of pumping shipments again Wednesday.
Egypt had voted in favor of two different proposals on Syria at the UN Security Council in October, angering Saudi Arabia. Shortly after, Saudi Aramco halted fuel supplies to Egypt indefinitely, giving no reasons.
The Saudi deal was for 700,000 tons of oil products a month for five years, under a $23 billion deal between Saudi Aramco and the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) to be paid off over 15 years.
Saudi Arabia has showered Egypt with billions of dollars in aid since 2013, when President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ousted elected President Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood and banned the Islamist movement, which Riyadh opposes.
