Blinken meets Egypt's foreign minister in Cairo

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty in Cairo.

The top US diplomat's visit comes as the region remains on high alert due to the risk of Gaza war expanding, accusing it of detonating pagers across Lebanon.

Blinken also met with Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi earlier in the day.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdellatty sayid: "We have to work more and more in order to further enhance our cooperation and everything. The United States is a superpower and Egypt is a super regional power so communications, consultations between us for better strengthening our relations is of great importance to Egypt and to the United States."

News of the blasts broke as the top US diplomat traveled to Cairo to meet senior Egyptian officials hoping to advance efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and improve ties with Egypt.

Asked about the blasts, Blinken said the United States was still gathering facts but it was in no one’s interest for conflict to spread.

“It’s imperative that all parties refrain from any actions that could escalate the conflict,” Blinken said at a news conference alongside his Egyptian counterpart.

He did not say who the US believes was behind the blasts.

Blinken said he was focused on securing a ceasefire deal that would bring calm, including to Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, and that 15 out of 18 paragraphs of a deal had been agreed by all sides.

“We’ve seen that in the intervening time, you might have an event, an incident – something that makes the process more difficult, that threatens to slow it, stop it, derail it – and anything of that nature, by definition, is probably not good in terms of achieving the result that we want, which is the ceasefire,” Blinken said.

Blinken will not visit Israel on this trip, the first time he has skipped a stop in Washington’s closest regional ally since Hamas sparked the war in Gaza nearly a year ago.