Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi on Monday begins a visit to France to underscore close ties with French President Emmanuel Macron, but with a renewed crackdown on political dissent at home, accusations grow against Macron of turning a blind eye to the increasing human rights violations of the el-Sissi regime.

Egypt and France have enjoyed an increasingly close relationship under the rule of el-Sissi, the former chief of general staff who toppled the country's first democratically elected president, Mohammed Morsi, in a bloody coup in 2013. Both countries enjoy common interests in Libya and the Mediterranean, along with their common rivalry against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. French authorities see Egypt as a key country in efforts to stabilize the troubled region, and Macron has warned that in the absence of Western support, Egypt could turn to the West’s authoritarian rivals China and Russia.

From 2013 to 2017, France was the main weapons supplier to Egypt. Those contracts have dried up, including deals for more Rafale fighter jets and warships that had been at an advanced stage. Diplomats say that is as much to do with financing issues as with France's response to human rights concerns. French parliamentary recommendations to the government in November aimed at toughening controls on weapons sales overseas, a particularly opaque systems in France, highlighted the deals with Egypt. The report said some of the equipment sold was being used for an internal crackdown. Investigative website Disclose on Monday published a classified government note outlining its hostility to the recommendations, which it said would impact national defense and the weapons export industry as a whole if implemented, as reported by Reuters.

France's close relationship with Egypt at a time when Cairo stands accused of serial human rights violations has concerned activists, who want Macron to make the issue central to the discussions. "French diplomacy has, at the highest levels, long indulged President el-Sissi's brutal repression of any form of dissent," a dozen human rights groups including Human Rights Watch (HRW), Amnesty International and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) said in a joint statement ahead of his visit. "It is now or never for President Macron to stand up for his self-declared commitment to promote human rights in Egypt."

Over 1,000 human rights violations were recorded in Egypt last year, according to a report released by the Cairo-based nongovernmental organization (NGO) El-Nadeem. As part of the violations, 283 cases of individual torture, 30 deaths in custody and 111 people who have been subject to medical negligence have taken place in the country, according to the report.

The shocking death of Egypt's first and only democratic president, Morsi, in an Egyptian courtroom last year put the spotlight on the dire conditions faced by political prisoners in the country. According to the Arab Organization for Human Rights, over 700 Egyptian prisoners have died as a result of medical negligence since 2011.

Since the bloody coup in 2013, a harsh crackdown on dissidents, not only from the Muslim Brotherhood but anyone who opposed el-Sissi, has commenced. The latest constitutional referendum last month paved the way for el-Sissi to remain in power until 2030.

Despite the country's struggle for economic improvement, human rights violations have become alarming. Human rights groups and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have said conditions in the detention centers, including medical and nutritional supplies, are insufficient. Likewise, an article by Maged Mandour published in 2018 by Sada, an online platform under Carnegie International, said that Egyptian security forces deliberately deprive the detainees of food so they will die of starvation.