Summary of Japanese Prime Minister Kaifu's conversation with Egyptian Minister of Cabinet Affairs Atef Ebeid. The brief chat included Ebeid's proposal of a desert greening project and Egypt's existing projects with Germany and the Netherlands.

This telegram is a summary of the plenary session during the summit between Japanese PM Kaifu and his Egyptian counterparts. During the conversation the two sides discussed the economic impact of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait on Egypt and Kaifu's decision to send $2billion in aid to Egypt, Turkey, and Jordan.

The small group session at the beginning of the meeting was suddenly, on instructions from President Hosni Mubarak, turned into a tete-a-tete meeting (only the other side’s Prime Minister Atef Sedky joined him), with the situation in the Gulf the only issue raised. The document is a summary of its main points. (Present from the other side was Prime Minister Sedky. Interpreter: Tsuruoka Koji).

Fu’ad Mursi (1925-1990), the author of the text printed here (an English excerpt translated from an Arabic-language monograph), was an Egyptian economist trained in Alexandria and the Sorbonne. While in Paris, he joined the French Communist Party. Back in Egypt, he in 1949 co-founded al-Hizb al-shuiu‘i al-misri, or the Egyptian Communist Party (ECP).

Born 27 years after a communist party had first been opened in the country, the ECP, also known as Rayat al-sha‘ab (The People’s Banner) after the title of its organ, was the smallest, most clandestine, and most intellectual communist group then operating in Egypt. It favored a two-state-solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, was opposed to Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918-1970), and in 1958 initiated the merger of Egypt’s communist parties (under the condition that Jews would be excluded), a story told e.g. in Joel Beinin’s Was the Red Flag Flying There? Marxist Politics and the Arab-Israeli Conflict in Egypt and Israel, 1948-1965 (1990). Nasser’s regime, which from the start had a difficult relationship with domestic communists, turned to open repression in 1959, locking up many party members in brutal desert prisons until 1964. The next year the party dissolved itself under pressure from the regime, which, however, also co-opted some individuals. Mursi was one of them.

Moreover, after Nasser’s death, Mursi early on continued a government career under the new president Anwar Sadat (1918-1981). In 1971, he became director of the state Industrial Bank and member of the Central Bank board, and in 1972 Minister of Supply and Domestic Commerce. The following year he resigned, however. Still a Marxist, he disagreed with Sadat’s policy of economic opening, infitah. While prepared from 1971, this policy became official in 1974—a story whose classic treatment is John Waterbury’s The Egypt of Nasser and Sadat: The Political Economy of Two Regimes (1983) and whose social dimension is told by Relli Shechter’s The Rise of the Egyptian Middle Class: Socio-Economic Mobility and Public Discontent from Nasser to Sadat (2019).

The text printed here reflects a key component in Mursi’s analysis of the infitah. He diagnoses a cooperation between private Egyptian capitalists—who were now on the rise again after the decline of Nasserite state capitalism (aka socialism)—and foreign capitalist colonialism that, while not any more occupying Egypt, again wishes to exploit the country

On May 3, 1961, Nikita Khrushchev met with a delegation from the United Arab Republic (UAR) led by Anwar Sadat. The meeting began with expressions of gratitude and solidarity, highlighting Soviet support for UAR independence and its struggle against imperialism, particularly in relation to the construction of the Aswan Dam and resistance to Western aggression in the Middle East. Khrushchev emphasized the superiority of socialism and communism, advocating the Soviet model as an example for nations striving for independence and progress. Sadat expressed appreciation for Soviet assistance and raised concerns about the financial burden of purchasing weapons from the USSR. He requested a reduction in the price, citing UAR’s commitments to supporting anti-imperialist struggles across Africa and Asia. Khrushchev acknowledged the UAR’s vital role in the global anti-colonial movement but maintained that the USSR could not lower its weapons prices due to its own economic constraints and the need for consistency in its aid policies. Despite these limitations, Khrushchev promised to explore alternative ways to assist the UAR. The conversation concluded with mutual respect and reaffirmation of Soviet-UAR solidarity.

This document summary was generated by an artificial intelligence language model and was reviewed by a Wilson Center staff member.

Zhou and Nasser discuss domestic conditions inside of Egypt, the Sino-Indian border war, and the possibilities for a nuclear weapons free zone in Africa and the Middle East.

Zhou Enlai describes the state of Sino-American relations and Sino-Indian relations. Zhou and Nasser also discuss the Egyptian economy and Sino-Egyptian relations.

Zhou Enlai criticises the developmental aid policies and practices of the United States and the Soviet Union. He and Sedky also discuss Chinese aid to Egypt.

Zhou and Enlai and Ali Sabry discuss developments in Algeria, prospects for the Second Asian-African Conference, Egypt's tenuous food situation and trade relations with countries such as Argentina, Canada, and the US, and the latest news from Vietnam.

Zhou and Nasser discuss developments in Algeria, the Second Asian-African Conference, oil in the Middle East, US foreign policy, and the economic situation in Egypt.