Iran supreme chief says he’d ‘welcome’ full diplomatic ties with Egypt; presidency web sites hacked

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Iran‘s supreme leader said Monday he’d “welcome” the restoration of full diplomatic ties between Egypt and the Islamic Republic, elevating the prospect of Cairo and Tehran normalizing relations after a long time of pressure.

The feedback by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei got here as a sequence of internet sites linked to Iran‘s presidency bore the pictures of two leaders of an exiled opposition group Monday, with others exhibiting the photographs of Khamenei and President Ebrahim Raisi crossed out.

Iranian state tv quoted Khamenei’s feedback as coming from a gathering he held with the visiting sultan of Oman, Haitham bin Tariq. Sultan Haitham’s journey to Tehran, his first since assuming energy in 2020, comes as Muscat lengthy has served as an interlocutor between Tehran and the West.

There have been rising indicators of Egypt and Iran doubtlessly restoring ties, significantly as Saudi Arabia and Iran reached a détente in March with Chinese mediation after years of tensions. Cairo depends on Saudi Arabia and different oil-rich Gulf Arab states for financial assist.

“We welcome this issue and have no problem in this regard,” Khamenei reportedly mentioned.

There was no instant response from Egypt to Khamenei’s feedback. Officials in Cairo didn’t reply to a request for remark.

Egypt beneath Anwar Sadat minimize ties to Iran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Sadat had been an in depth pal to the deposed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, welcomed him to Egypt simply earlier than his loss of life and hosted his state funeral in 1980. The shah’s stays are entombed at Cairo’s Al-Rifai Mosque. Egypt’s peace cope with Israel additionally angered Iran‘s theocratic authorities, which views Israel as its high regional enemy.

After the 2011 Arab Spring and the election of President Mohammed Morsi, an Islamist who belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood, relations warmed with Iran. However, a 2013 navy overthrow ousted Morsi and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi took energy, instantly cooling the outreach to Tehran.

Meanwhile Monday, an web account describing itself as a bunch of hackers claimed accountability for defacing web sites related to Iran‘s presidency. The account GhyamSarnegouni, whose title in Farsi means “Rise to Overthrow,” beforehand claimed hacking web sites related to Iran‘s Foreign Ministry earlier this month.

Associated Press journalists accessing the websites discovered them defaced with pictures of Massoud Rajavi, the long-missing chief of the Iranian exile group Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, and his spouse Maryam, who’s now the general public face of the group. Hours later, semiofficial information businesses in Iran acknowledged the web sites being down, with out providing a purpose why.

One website bore the slogan: “Death to Khamenei Raisi – Hail to Rajavi.” Iran‘s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Iran‘s president Ebrahim Raisi each have been focused equally within the beforehand claimed hacked in May.

Iran has been focused by a sequence of embarrassing hacks amid the rising tensions over its quickly advancing nuclear program. That’s included the sign of Iranian state tv being focused, gasoline pumps that present backed gasoline being focused in a cyberattack and authorities surveillance digital camera imagery being launched, together with from a infamous jail.

The Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, identified by the acronym MEK, referred to as the hack “very extensive” when reached, however didn’t declare credit score for it. The MEK had angrily condemned a prisoner swap Belgium carried out with Iran on Friday to free an help employee that noticed an Iranian diplomat convicted of being behind a bomb plot focusing on the group launched.

The MEK started as a Marxist group opposing the shah’s rule. It claimed and was suspected in a sequence of assaults in opposition to U.S. officers in Iran within the Nineteen Seventies, one thing the group now denies.

It supported the 1979 Islamic Revolution, however quickly had a falling out with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and turned in opposition to the cleric. It carried out a sequence of assassinations and bombings focusing on the younger Islamic Republic.

The MEK later fled into Iraq and backed dictator Saddam Hussein throughout his bloody eight-year warfare in opposition to Iran within the Nineteen Eighties. That noticed many oppose the group in Iran. Although largely primarily based in Albania, the group claims to function a community inside Iran.