Morsy Admonishes Iran over Support for Syria’s Al-Assad

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy on Tuesday admonished the Iranian foreign minister that the Islamic Republic’s support for Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad is detrimental to the process of reconciling the long disruption in relations between Egypt and Iran. Morsy has been trying to broker an end to the 19-month-long violence in Syria by creating a “Quartet” comprised of Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. With the exception of Iran, all support an end to the Assad regime. Morsy’s plan is to use the normalization of relations with Iran and the Arab world as the carrot. The meeting with Foreign Minister Yassir Ali is a continuation of a conversation begun with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran last month when Morsy became the first Egyptian president to visit Iran since the two countries severed ties in 1979. Morsy is also dangling restoration of ties with the wealthy Gulf States as a return for abandoning Assad.