Qatar has not changed policies toward Egypt: Sisi

CAIRO-18 December 2019: Qatar has not changed its policies to trigger reconciliation, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said at the World Youth Forum on Tuesday.

In his answer to a question on the tension between Qatar and three Gulf states as well as Egypt at the event in Sharm el-Sheikh resort, Sisi said 13 conditions were set to ease relations, but none of them have been met.

“We hope that any honest efforts succeed to lead to permanent commitments,” the Egyptian president said.

“When you look at certain media outlets, we find unobjective handling [of news] with the purpose of harming Egypt. Our own media has to pay attention to that,” he added.

“This isn’t media or objectivity, this is conspiring, but we wish there would be work on a healthy relationship,” he continued.

Sisi said that if he had the budget of the “states that attack Egypt,” he would have transformed the country, criticizing that instead of utilizing the money productively, such countries use it to destroy other nations.

The Egyptian authorities have repeatedly criticized Al-Jazeera news network, which is owned by the Qatari royal family, for handling Egyptian news, and other news from the region, in an “inciting” manner.