Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Thursday inaugurated an $8.5 billion major expansion to the Suez Canal in a lavish ceremony. The New Suez Canal opening ceremony in the port city of Ismailiya was attended by a host of foreign leaders including French President Francois Hollande, according to Arab News.
"We, Egyptians, promised this new canal as a gift to the world; and today we are fulfilling this promise in record time," al-Sisi said, according to Egyptian presidential office statement.
"The Egyptian people completed the New Suez Canal under the most difficult circumstances economically and in terms of security. The powers of terrorism and extremism were at war with Egypt and the Egyptians," al-Sisi said.
Al-Sisi announced the expansion project in August 2014. It is the first major Egyptian project completed since the former military chief al-Sisi took office last year.
"It's an achievement for the people who managed to fund it as a national project and accomplished it through perseverance and hard work," the presidential office said.
The Suez Canal Authority hopes that the new waterway will double Suez Canal's earnings from the current $5.3 billion per year to some $13 billion annually, according to Bloomberg.
The expansion includes a new 35-kilometer channel and 37 kilometers of widening and deepening of the 193-kilometer Suez Canal, according to BBC. The New Suez Canal likely to cut ship transit time between the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea from 22 hours to around 10 hours.
The Suez Canal, which links Mediterranean Sea to Red Sea, is one of the world's busiest waterways. It was inaugurated in 1869 and nationalized in 1956.
