Jordan, ASEAN countries plan economic forum as investments increase

CAIRO: Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi met German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Sunday on the sidelines of the G20 summit in India.

The leaders discussed current and future economic cooperation initiatives, as well as opportunities to further increase German investment in Egypt, particularly in the transportation, manufacturing and energy sectors, said the president’s spokesman Ahmed Fahmy.

Efforts to combat illegal immigration were also considered, along with regional and international issues, including the conflict in Sudan and the war between Russia and Ukraine.

In a separate meeting on Sunday, El-Sisi held talks with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in New Delhi.

In a speech at the summit’s closing session, Egypt’s leader said: “Talking about the future leads me to highlight the broad hopes placed on technological transformation to increase productivity and generate new jobs for growth and investment.

“However, to ensure a better future for humanity as a whole, it is necessary to close the enormous technological gap between countries so that technological progress does not become an additional factor of inequality.

“It is no secret that concern has been growing for years about the impact of automation and artificial intelligence on the future of employment.

“This could double the negative social and economic impact on developing countries that rely on labor-intensive industries. This could also jeopardize the progress made in development efforts,” El-Sisi added.

Calling for multilateral cooperation on global issues, he said: “We need to quickly address existing challenges before they exacerbate and cause crises that are difficult to resolve.

“There is an urgent need to address the debt problem of developing countries, which has assumed dangerous dimensions as a result of high debt service burdens, not only in low-income countries but also in middle-income countries.” .

“The issue requires quick and decisive resolutions to avoid the outbreak of a global debt crisis.

“Our commitment to the sustainable development agenda and the objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change requires us to ensure the availability of the necessary financing and improve the international financing system and the practices of multilateral development banks.

“This can be achieved by increasing their credit capacity, in particular by providing concessional finance, while ensuring that climate finance does not come at the expense of development finance.

“As Egypt as President of COP27, I would like to reiterate the importance of providing the means for implementation, in terms of financing, through the fulfillment of the commitments of developed countries, in addition to technology transfer,” he added. El-Sisi. .