Egyptian foreign ministry, Ahmed Abu Zeid, denies buying North Korea arms for its military

Egyptian foreign ministry spokesperson Ahmed Abu Zeid has denied a report by the Washington Post claiming that a shipment of weapons from North Korea seized by Egyptian authorities in 2016 was in fact destined for the Egyptian military. The US newspaper reported that the Egyptian military was the actual undisclosed buyer of $23 million worth of rocket-propelled grenades seized by the Egyptian customs authority in August 2016 in Egyptian national waters after a receiving a tip from US intelligence. In a detailed statement sent to AFP on Monday, Abu Zeid “entirely dismissed” the claim that Egypt was the final destination for the shipment. He insists that “the shipment that was confiscated was not destined for Egypt”. “Egyptian authorities confiscated and destroyed the shipment in the presence of a team of experts from the 1718 committee overseeing the UNSC sanctions on North Korea”, Abu-Zeid told AFP.