Egypt deploys pilots to boost Syrian anti-terror fight: Paper

Egypt has reportedly sent 18 helicopter pilots to Syria to support the war-torn Arab nation in its fight against terrorism, and mulls more deployments to the same end early next year.

On Thursday, Lebanese As-Safir paper cited “well-informed Arab sources” as reporting that Egypt had dispatched the pilots to an airbase in the western Syria city of Hama on November 12, adding that the contingent was joined by four senior Egyptian military figures upon arrival.

It added that two Egyptian major generals had also been operating at the Armed Forces Staff Headquarters in the Syrian capital Damascus since last month. They have been touring frontlines, including the “Southern Front” in the city of Quneitra.

The daily cited one source “close to the Syria file” as saying that a large deployment of Egyptian troops will arrive in Syria in late January 2017 to take part in military operations “not limited to air support at Hama airbase.”

Major General Ali Mamlouk, the Head of Syria’s National Security Bureau, had paid an official one-day visit to the Egyptian capital, Cairo, in October and held talks with senior Egyptian intelligence officials.

The two sides reached an agreement on “coordinating political standpoints” and improving bilateral “cooperation in the combat against terrorism” during the talks, official Syrian Arab News Agency reported at the time.

A month earlier, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry had announced that Cairo and Riyadh did not share common attitudes vis-à-vis the ongoing crisis in Syria. Shoukry had said that terrorist groups cannot remain in Syria if peace is to be achieved in the conflict-stricken Arab country.

ME