Vivid News 24: Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, the president of Egypt, will be the special guest during the Republic Day parade the following year. This was said in a statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs on Sunday. In any case, this is the first time that New Delhi has invited the head of state of an Arab nation to the Republic Day ceremony. In October of this year, Egypt was visited by External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar.
He met President Sisi on October 16. At that time, the Foreign Minister handed over the invitation letter sent by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to him. Note, the then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was invited by the Narendra Modi government for Republic Day 2021. But at that time, his visit to India was cancelled due to the increase in the number of Covid infections in Britain.
Delhi invited 5 Central Asian leaders to this year’s Republic Day. Like Boris Johnson, their tour was cancelled due to the outbreak of Covid. As a result, the Republic Day program had to be held without the chief guest for the last two years.
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Apart from naming the chief guest for Republic Day on Sunday, the Center also made a big announcement about the G-20 summit. Egypt will be invited as a ‘guest country’ to next year’s G-20 summit, according to a statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Note that New Delhi has already got the responsibility of chairing the G-20 conference. However, the Center has not yet announced which city of the country this conference will be held in 2023. India is celebrating 75 years of diplomatic relations with Egypt this year.
Political analysts claim, in this climate, the invitation to the President of the ‘Pyramid Country’ on Republic Day is a very significant event. Through this move, New Delhi is trying to draw the countries of the Middle East closer. They claimed that Arab countries will come closer to India in the future in terms of commercial and diplomatic relations.
Since the first Republic Day ceremony in 1950, the custom of inviting the head of state of a friendly country has been going on. The then-Indonesian President Sukarno was the chief guest at the first Republic Day ceremony. In 1952, 1953, and 1966, the Republic Day parade was held without foreign guests.
In 2018, the highest number of heads of state came as the chief guest at this event. That year, 10 heads of state from ASEAN countries came to Delhi. In addition, the then US President Barack Obama was the chief guest in 2015. Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2007, then French President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2008 and 2016, and Francis came to Holland as chief guests.
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