In a statement, the Greek Foreign Ministry guaranteed that an agreement may be a "guiding" criterion for future agreements signed by Greece and the European Union with

external countries to combat illegal migration , and within the framework of a pilot program agreed by both the Arab Republic of Egypt and Greece, Egypt intends to send 5 thousand seasonal workers to help meet the growing needs of the agricultural sector in Greece.

"We hope that the first Egyptian workers will arrive in the Greek fields early next year to help with the next harvest,"Deputy Foreign Minister Miltiades Varvitsiotis said after signing the agreement with his Egyptian counterpart Ehab Nasr.

Egyptian agricultural workers will have the right to enter and stay in Greece for up to nine months before returning to their homeland.

Greece and Egypt signed a treaty in 2020 to define their own exclusive economic zone in the eastern Mediterranean, a region with promising oil and gas reserves.

The two countries are also seeking to establish an undersea cable to transport electricity produced using renewable sources from North Africa to Europe in the first infrastructure project of its kind in the Mediterranean.