CAIRO: Iranian state-run news network Press TV reported on Monday the appointment of Ali Akbar Sibouyeh as the first Iranian ambassador to Egypt after the Islamic Revolution. Ali Akbar Sibouyeh was formerly translator at the Iranian Foreign Ministry between 1995-2001 and charge d'affaires in Tunisia during 2001-2005. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast declined any confirmation of the report, saying that Tehran will “appoint an ambassador to Egypt on the first possible occasion.” The passage of two Iranian warships through the Suez Canal in the immediate aftermath of Hosni Mubarak's ouster was seen as a warning to the international community of possible shifts in political relations within the region. During talks in Baku, Azerbaijan, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad supported the prospects of resuming Iranian-Egyptian relations, holding this development as “obvious and positive”, last week. Also Egyptian Foreign Minister Nabil el-Arabi spoke in favor of turning a new page with Iran, earlier this month. Many isolated voices expressed their support to el-Arabi, including Egyptian Shia scholar Ahmad Rasem al-Nafis. “If Egypt is seeking to regain the glory and greatness of its past, it must restore its relations with great and civilized nations like Iran,” Nafis told Teheran Times in an interview. In a meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akhbar Salehi, Egyptian Islamist activist and leader of the Amal Party Magdi Hussein even claimed that the Egyptian uprisings was inspired by the 1979 Iranian revolution. Diplomatic relations between Tehran and Cairo were officially suspended for the past 32 years, following the 1979 Islamic Revolution that brought Ayatollah Khomeini to lead the country. The signing of the Camp David Agreements that normalized political relations between Israel and Egypt is at the roots of the fracture. Sadat's opening to the global markets and to IFI-led policies turned Egypt into “the backyard of the United States in the Middle East,” writes online newspaper Tehran Times. Moreover, Mubarak's anti-Iranian stance during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war made things worsen, considered also Mubarak's support to the UAE's claim on the property of three contested Island in the Persian Gulf. BM
