In a major speech at Non-Aligned Movement summit in Tehran, President Morsi says Syrian regime has lost legitimacy, makes conciliatory comments about 'sister' Islamic Republic of Iran
Dina Ezzat , Tehran, Alahram
In this photo released by the official website of the Iranian presidency office, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, second right, welcomes Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi for the opening session of the Nonaligned Movement, NAM, summit, in Tehran, Iran, Thursday, Aug. 30, 2012.(Photo:AP)
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President Mohamed Morsi entered Tehran's Summit Conference Hall on Thursday morning to hand over the presidency of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) to his Iranian counterpart Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.The fact that Morsi chose to accept the Iranian invitation to be in Tehran, with which Cairo has not had full diplomatic relations for three decades, was itself a revolutionary move.
What was indeed more revolutionary was Morsi's speech to the opening session of the NAM summit, the 16th since its establishment during the Cold War.
At the beginning of his speech Morsi made his by now common Islamist reference, "May God's peace be upon his Prophet Mohamed."
He added, "And may the peace of God be on the holy family of the Prophet." This reference to the 'family of Prophet Mohamed' might have been designed to send a positive message to his predominantly Shia hosts who are said to have been offended by remarks he made during a July visit to Saudi Arabia, another Sunni power in the Middle East, which indicated a Sunni-Shia polarisation between Egypt and Saudi Arabia on one hand and Iran on the other.
Then Morsi went further and paid the most unusual tribute in a political speech at an international summit to the Sahaba (close associates) of Prophet Mohamed: Abu Bakr, Omar, Othman and Ali.
The reference to Ali, the most holy member of the Prophet Mohamed's family in the eyes of Shias, could have been perceived by Morsi's Shia audience in the conference hall as flattering had it not come after references to Abu Bakr, Omar and Othman, who are abhorred by Shias and whose role in early Muslim history is not even mentioned in the history books of Iranian schools.
A non-traditional reference was also made by Morsi when referring to Egypt's role in the launch of the NAM in the 1950s. "At the time Nasser was expressing the will of the people (of Egypt) to defy colonisation," Morsi said.
The fact that this first ever civilian, Islamist and freely elected Egyptian president, who comes from the ranks of the Muslim Brotherhood, who was an opponent of the Mubarak regime – despite short intervals of cooperation – makes a reference to Nasser is again something that goes beyond the predictable. However, the style of the reference is not necessarily free of all pejorative implications, at least to the ears of an average Nasser admirer.
The norm has been that Nasser is referred to in this context as "Leader Gamal Abdel-Nasser, one of the champions of the march against colonisation."
Beyond his references to Ali and Nasser, Morsi's speech included other non-traditional comments.
The president's references to the Palestinian cause broke away from the usual déjà vu statements about the right of Palestinians to statehood – and it certainly made no reference to the now notorious "two-state solution."
Instead, Morsi made some coherent statements about Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people – things that had almost completely dropped out of official Egyptian discourse on the Palestinian issue.
On Syria, Morsi's speech all but equated the Assad regime with the Israeli occupation of Palestine when he referred to "the struggle for freedom by the Palestinian and Syrian peoples."
Furthermore, Morsi said the Assad regime "had lost all legitimacy" and it was not enough to show sympathy towards the Syrian people, but the time had come to act upon this sympathy.
Morsi's statements on Syria certainly went way beyond the liking of his Iranian hosts who remain committed to the Assad regime, and caused the Syrian delegation to leave the conference hall.
Indeed, Iranian officials almost never speak of a "Syrian revolution" but of "unrest in Syria."
Morsi also went beyond the expected when he called the Iranian president "my dear brother" upon turning over the presidency of summit from Egypt to Iran. Interestingly, he called Iran "the sister Islamic republic of Iran."
Moreover, Morsi made the traditional references to the role of the NAM in pursuing a more peaceful and less discriminatory world in which the UN Security Council is freed from the veto hegemony of the five permanent members, and the UN General Assembly is made more effective in running world affairs.
Morsi also observed his self-made tradition of referring to the unity of "the Egyptian people and its glorious army" during the 25 January Revolution.
Also maintained was Morsi's tradition of following his reference to "Egypt is a civil state" – this time around he added "in every sense of the word" – with the phrase Egypt is "a national, constitutional, democratic and modern state."
Morsi arrived in Tehran for the NAM summit on Thursday morning. He is scheduled to return to Cairo later in the day after a five-day trip that started in and was largely spent in Beijing, where he explored avenues for wider economic and trade cooperation.
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