Cairo: In what could be a historic turning point in Egypt’s foreign relations, some observers believe that Russia is planning to fill in a power vacuum following emerging differences between the US and Egypt over the course of its future. Without outright calling it a coup, US President Barack Obama has voiced concern over the military’s ousting over the country’s first democratically elected leader Mohammad Mursi. Washington is now at a turning point in its relations with Egypt stuck between a long and historic military cooperation and a growing understanding that Egypt is not as important as it once was before in terms of regional influence.

“Moscow’s public stance currently doesn’t go beyond calling for reconciliation and dialogue, but secretly they may negotiate supportive measurements, Nabil Rashwan, a specialist in Russian affairs told Gulf News. “The dithering of Obama’s administration may result in Russia exerting greater influence in the region than at anytime since the depths of the Cold War. Egypt and Syria could both become de facto client states of Putin’s Russia,” Rashwan added.

“The economic relations between Egypt and Russia are currently excellent and Russian tourism in Egypt is thriving”. In 2010 the volume of trade and economic cooperation between the two countries amounted to $2.1 billion (Dh7.713 billion). The number of Russian tourists visiting Egypt in 2010 alone was estimated to be 2.85, making it the number one country in providing Egypt with tourists. Egypt’s military armament relying on US is one of the American national security interests, according to Daniel Kurtzer, a former US ambassador to Egypt. “Since the 1970s, the Egyptian military has been in transition from Soviet arms, doctrine and training. This process is far from complete, and the military may be too committed to US arms to change yet again. To be sure, arms from other suppliers have been and can continue to be assimilated into the inventory, but there is simply too much American equipment on hand for the military brass to consider a change in primary patrons,” Kurtzer wrote in his study “Egypt’s Entrenched Military”, published last year. “If Egypt’s army shifts towards the Russian weapons systems it will need a long period of time,” Rashwan said. He also doesn’t expect that the Russians rush in to build an anti-American alliance in the Middle East. “They are no longer as ideological as they were before. In addition, US-Russian relations are strong and complicated enough that they can’t engage in a major conflict with Washington sacrificing their ties to it,” Rashwan added. But Jihad Ouda, head of the political science department of Helwan University, disagrees relatively with Rashwan. “Egypt’s interim government may face a long-lasting pressure from US and the West, therefore it needs, not only regional support, such as the open backing by Saudi King Abdullah and other Gulf States, but also a global power assistance,” the political science professor added. “Putin’s Russia has been instrumental in propping up the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad. Without Russian diplomatic, military, logistical and moral support, the Syrian regime wouldn’t have survived this long. Egypt’s interim government needs such support urgently because it determined to go its way to the very end. The US and EU will likely impose sanctions on the Egyptian military to restrain its new authorities. But Putin appears ready to step in when others exit the scene,” Ouda explained. “If President Obama cancels military aid to Egypt, Russia will almost certainly pick up the pieces and make a fortune. Russia is, after all, one of the world’s largest arms exporters — second only to America,” Ouda added. Putin appears to be seizing on Egypt’s situation and the US response to it to expand Russia’s influence in the Middle East, according to Soliman Shafiq, a prominent leftist intellectual.

“Russia is deeply involved in the crisis in Egypt. It’s a golden chance for Russia to ride itself of the last vestiges and imprints of negative publicity that only a decade ago peaked in the Arab world. Arabs have distrusted Russia but now they distrust the US.” Shafiq added. The newswire ITAR-TASS quoted a Russian Foreign Ministry source as saying: “Russia and UAE came out for peaceful, non-violent resolution of problems of countries in the region, respect for sovereignty of states and non-interference in their internal affairs. The two sides intended to explore a possible partnership between Russia and the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council”. Official statements and state-media reports indicate Moscow is also leaning heavily towards Egypt’s military in the crisis. Igor Morozov, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the upper house of Russia’s Parliament, said he believed that “the Egyptian army has always been playing an important and even crucial role in every political crisis in Egypt”. Morozov went on to blame the US and the EU for Egypt’s current situation because of their support for Mursi and the Muslim Brotherhood. “It appears that Russia is betting on the Egyptian military prevailing in the current standoff and is already busy acting on that assumption. With additional US sanctions against the army likely to be forthcoming, this gamble could have a handsome payoff for Moscow should it prove accurate,” Shafiq said. “Putin is the first non-Arab leader to express a keen interest in visiting Egypt after Mursi’s removal. It is not clear when he will arrive in Cairo. But if Putin comes in the next few weeks he will not just discuss the situation in Egypt, it is said, and prospective arms deals to be signed. He is also scheduled to discuss Syria,” an Egyptian diplomat said.

— The writer is a journalist based in Cairo