Iranian President Mohammed Khatami said in remarks published here Tuesday that he is planning to visit Egypt "soon" for a meeting with President Hosni Mubarak, the first such encounter since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Khatami said he "intends to visit Cairo soon" and "stressed the deep and historic ties that link Egypt and Iran," Egypt's government Al-Ahram newspaper reported from Doha where Khatami is visiting for a summit of Muslim countries.
Khatami has never visited Egypt since he was elected in 1997, while Mubarak has never traveled to Iran since he assumed the presidency in 1981.
Relations between the two countries were severed in 1980, shortly after the Islamic revolution that toppled the shah of Iran, but they have warmed gradually since the beginning of the 1990s.
They each have diplomats stationed in interests sections in the Swiss embassies in Cairo and Tehran.
Mubarak telephoned Khatami on June 21 this year, marking the first direct top-level contact in 20 years -- CAIRO (AFP)
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