CAIRO, October 22. /TASS/. President of Egypt Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is currently heading for Kazan to participate in the BRICS Summit during which he, among other things, will have a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, the Egyptian presidential office said in a statement.
"Today, President of Egypt Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is heading for Russia to attend the BRICS Summit underway in the city of Kazan. <...> On the sidelines of the summit, al-Sisi plans to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and other BRICS leaders who will participate in the summit to discuss bilateral relations as well as the latest developments in the regional and international arena," al-Sisi’s spokesman Ahmed Famy said on his page on Facebook (a social media site banned in Russia since it is owned by Meta corporation deemed extremist by the Russian authorities).
Among other issues, the Egyptian leader will discuss "ways of reforming the global financial structure and more actively involving developing economies in it." Al-Sisi will also use the BRICS meeting to hold talks on the current situation in the Middle East where the conflict "risks expanding into a regional war that would pose risks to all Middle Eastern nations and the entire world."
The 16th BRICS summit, which is the key event of Russia’s chairmanship in the association, will be held in Kazan on October 22-24. The BRICS group was founded in 2006 by Brazil, Russia, India and China, with South Africa joining in 2011. On January 1, this year, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt became its full-fledged members. The Kazan summit will be the first to be attended by new members of the association. Representatives of over 30 countries are expected to take part. Chinese leader Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, President of South Africa Cyril Ramaphosa and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed have already arrived in Kazan.