Investors and financial players are split over the potential impact the Egyptian air raids on Islamic State camps in Libya will have, economic daily Al-Mal newspaper reported.
Chairman of the Libyan-Egyptian Friendship Association Nasser al-Bayan said that Libyan investors back the Egyptian operations. He added that since the volume of trade turnover between the two countries does not exceed 20 percent, there will be no significant repercussions resulting from the strikes.
Sherif al-Gabaly, however, who is head of the exporters division at the Federation of Egypt Chambers of Commerce, is predicting a hiatus in Egypt's exports to Libya in the coming period. Gebaly revealed that exports have already been in recess recently, due to the increasingly fragile security situation in Libya.
ِAccording to Al-Mal, the execution of the 21 Egyptian hostages by the Islamic State will cast its shadow over the tourism sector. It quoted Adel Abdel Razeq, a member of the Egyptian Tourism Federation, as expecting the next week to witness the negative impact of these events on the tourism sector, especially in Sharm al-Sheikh and Hurghada.
The internal conflict in Libya, and Egypt’s military action against Islamic State strongholds, has already negatively impacted commercial activity in the province of Matrouh. Rabie Gaballah, assistant secretary of the province’s chamber of commerce, stated that sales in Matrouh’s market declined by 50 percent in the past two days.
According to Gaballah, the people of Matrouh are 80 percent reliant on commercial exchanges with Libya due to the fact that there is an absence of investments and industrial projects in the area.
Qassem Eissa, head of Matrouh's chamber of commerce, noted that since last Wednesday, neither individuals nor commercial trucks have passed through the Salloum border crossing with Libya over security fears there.
