French President Francois Hollande said Wednesday
Egypt had agreed to buy two Mistral warships
which France built for Russia before scrapping the
sale over the Ukraine crisis. The deal is the second big military contract this year
between France and Egypt, which Hollande said he
increasingly views as a strategic partner. “It was my preferred buyer because we already
have military cooperation with Egypt,” Hollande
said of the deal he struck with President Abdel
Fattah al-Sisi. “Egypt plays an important role in the Middle East
and wants to move towards a democratic
transition, which is not easy, and we should
support their efforts.” French government sources said Egypt would pay
950 million euros ($1 billion) for the warships, with
“significant” financing from Saudi Arabia. The two warships, which can each carry 16
helicopters, four landing craft and 13 tanks, were
ordered by Russia in 2011 in a 1.2-billion-euro
deal. France found itself in an awkward situation as the
delivery date neared in 2014, with ties between
Russia and the West plunging to Cold War lows
over Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and support
for separatists in eastern Ukraine. Paris faced the wrath of its allies around the world if
it were to deliver the technology to Russia, and
decided to cancel the delivery. It was an expensive decision for France, which has
had to foot the bill of over one billion euros for the
upkeep of the ships and the cost of training 400
Russian sailors to crew them. After months of intense negotiations, France and
Russia agreed on the reimbursement of the deal in
August. Paris returned 949.7 million euros which had
already been paid and also committed not to sell
the two warships to a country that could
“contravene Russia’s interests”, such as Poland or
the Baltic states, a diplomatic source told AFP. Several other countries were said to be interested in
the warships, including Canada, India and
Singapore.