The ongoing surge of right-wing and populist parties in the European Union nations indicates that the continent’s political landscape is shifting. The consequences of this political reconfiguration are likely to impact the block boundaries and are expected to influence the European neighborhood policy, particularly affecting development cooperation with adjacent countries. The dominance of anti-migration rhetoric is set to intensify, with far-right groups likely reinforcing the EU’s controversial migration agreements and externalization policies, potentially undermining the bloc’s human rights and democracy commitments.
On 29 June, Egypt signed a one billion Euro agreement with the European Union to support Egypt’s struggling macro-economy. This deal, part of a larger 7.4 billion agreement signed in March 2024, aims to tackle significant regional energy shortage issues and curb migration. The impact of this agreement on Egypt’s migration policy could be substantial, as it is compared to other contracts signed by the EU with countries like Turkey, Tunisia, and Mauritania to curb migration to European countries.
The EU and Egypt also signed the Green Sustainable Industry program, supported by a €30 million EU grant to help Egyptian industry to invest in pollution reduction, decarbonization, energy, and resource efficiency, and three financing agreements worth a total of €36 million, as part of bilateral cooperation programs.
While the EU-Egypt collaboration puts economic cooperation at the face of this partnership, the focus primarily remains on migrant containment and border control.
The joint statement underlined that Egypt and the EU would adopt a ‘holistic approach’ to migration governance with the European Union to provide the ‘necessary financial support’ to assist Egypt with migration-related programs. These efforts aim to develop a comprehensive approach to migration, including legal pathways, and mobility schemes like Talent Partnerships, addressing the root causes of irregular migration, combating smuggling and trafficking, enhancing border management, and ensuring dignified return and reintegration.
“The EU and Egypt will continue to cooperate in order to support Egypt’s efforts in hosting refugees and both sides are committed to protecting the rights of migrants and refugees,” the statement noted.
Egypt’s struggling economy
Egypt’s macro-economy has struggled since the Covid-19 crisis and the unprecedented war between Russia and Ukraine. An ever-increasing debt crisis and an ongoing lending mechanism from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Gulf state donors have scrutinized Egypt’s economy, with no horizon of escaping its debt trap in the short term. Over the last five years, the Egyptian pound has been floated against foreign currencies at least twice, which has caused unprecedented inflation rates – sometimes reaching 40 percent – and unprecedented high poverty rates.
The ongoing war in the Gaza Strip and the blockage of the Red Sea by the Houthis have severely affected Egypt’s ability to deal with its financial crisis. However, the mediator role it has played since the beginning of the war between Israel and Hamas has strengthened its negotiating power with Western lenders, including the EU and IMF.
“One hundred days ago, we opened a new era in the relations between Egypt and the European Union with our strategic and comprehensive partnership. Today, we deliver. We deliver for Egyptian businesses and entrepreneurs with €1 billion in macro-financial assistance,” European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said following the signing of the MoU with Egypt. She added that European companies were signing more than 40 billion euros worth of deals with Egyptian firms, spanning a wide range of industries.
The new era the commissioner refers to puts EU interests at the center of the agreement. This era prioritizes curbing migration in the Mediterranean and allowing a substantial amount of gas to EU countries instead of prioritizing human rights and democracy. Several human rights groups have widely criticized the deal due to its humanitarian law violations, and described it as “another EU ‘cash for migrant control’ deal.” The consequences of this agreement will unfold on Egypt’s domestic political issues, potentially bringing about significant change given its dire economic situation, electricity crisis, and regional instability.
Surging anti-migrants sentiment
The International Migration Organisation (IOM) estimates that approximately 9 million people are migrants in Egypt, the majority of which are from Sudan, Syria, Yemen, and Libya. However, only 3% of this number are registered as refugees, while the remaining 97% are not registered with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). In a recent wave of anti-migrants and refugee sentiment, the Egyptian Prime Minister, Moustafa Madbouly, called upon donor agencies and development partners to share the burden of the estimated 9 million migrants in Egypt.
Similar comments were made by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) on World Refugees Day. This statement has been repeatedly expressed by President Sisi and his top government officials, and during the last World Economic Forum (WFE) meeting in Riyad, Egypt’s Prime Minister, Moustafa Madbouly, declared that refugees and migrants bear the Egyptian budget of around 10 billion $US per year.
Earlier this year, the government vowed to revise the regulations for migrants and refugees who are residents of the country. Most recently, the government has issued a decree that undocumented refugees or migrants with expired resident permits should pay 1,000 $US or face deportation. The government’s move towards the legalization of undocumented refugees and migrants, which for a long time enjoyed a relaxed legal framework, can be seen as a new source of foreign currency that the government sees as an opportunity to collect more foreign currency.
In recent years, the government has also taken other initiatives to maximize its ability to collect more revenues from foreign currency. The government has repeatedly used the same narrative to influence the European government’s bilateral and multilateral aid allocation to Egypt.
Racism on social media
The government crackdown on refugees and migrants emerged amid an increasing anti-refugee sentiment that went viral on social media, calling for a boycott of Syrian refugees-owned businesses earlier this year. Moreover, racist comments have surged on social media channels, as a recent video that went viral on social media claimed that Egyptians should take back the streets from the black Sudanese refugees. Other social media commentators blamed Sudanese refugees, among other groups, for the rising costs of rental apartments in Cairo, claiming that migrant groups have dominated entire neighborhoods.
Human rights groups also documented other harassment incidents. Despite the co-existence of refugees and migrants with host communities over the last decade, the upsurge of anti-refugee and migrants’ rhetoric on social media echoed the government’s official discourse on the contribution of refugees and migrants to Egypt’s economic crisis. Especially media platforms connected to the state security apparatus have been vocal about the issue, sponsoring the state narrative and intensifying their coverage of incidents against refugees.
Notably, this anti-migrant discourse found its breeding ground among far-right groups in European countries, which have slowly trickled down to other host countries in the Mediterranean. For example, similar anti-refugee sentiments – which in some cases evolved into violence against refugees – have been on the rise in Turkey.
A major data leak of more than 3 million Syrian refugees was spread on social media and telegram groups over the last week. As a result, Syrian refugees’ businesses and properties have been targeted by mob violence.
