Egypt's Minister of Environment Yasmine Fouad on Thursday held talks with Abdullah bin Ali Al Amri, Head of Oman's Environment Authority and President of UNEA-7, to explore current and future cooperation between the two countries in key environmental areas. The meeting took place on the sidelines of the 20th session of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN-20), hosted by Libya in Nairobi from July 14 to 18, 2025, under the theme "Four Decades of Environmental Action in Africa: Reflecting on the Past and Imagining the Future." Fouad highlighted Egypt's efforts during its presidency of the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP14), including the launch of a global initiative in 2018 by President Abdel Fattah El Sisi to integrate the three Rio Conventions on climate change, biodiversity, and desertification. She emphasised that environmental challenges are deeply interconnected and cannot be addressed in isolation. "We cannot continue theoretical discussions about interlinkages without practical steps," she said, noting that land degradation policies directly support biodiversity conservation and that nature-based solutions to climate change also help preserve soil and ecosystems. She called for a unified approach to tackling all three issues simultaneously, stressing that such an integrated message would be well received, especially by developed countries. Attribution: Amwal Al Ghad English Subediting: M. S. Salama
