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Oman's Sultan in Iran for Talks on Diplomatic, Security Issues 


A handout picture provided by the Iranian presidency shows Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi (R) meeting with Oman's Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said in Tehran, May 28, 2023. (Photo by Iranian Presidency / AFP)
A handout picture provided by the Iranian presidency shows Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi (R) meeting with Oman's Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said in Tehran, May 28, 2023. (Photo by Iranian Presidency / AFP)

Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said arrived in Tehran for a two-day visit Sunday which is expected to focus on regional diplomatic and security issues, Iranian state media reported, two days after Muscat mediated a prisoner swap between Iran and Belgium.

Oman has long been an interlocutor for the West with Iran and has mediated the release of several foreign citizens and dual nationals.

On Friday, Oman helped secure the release of a Belgian aid worker, who was arrested in 2022 and sentenced to 40 years in prison and 74 lashes on charges including spying, in exchange for an Iranian diplomat sentenced to 20 years in prison in connection with a failed bomb plot in France.

But dozens of foreigners and dual nationals remain in jail in Iran, most facing espionage and security-related accusations. Rights groups have criticized the arrests as a tactic by Tehran to win concessions from the West by inventing charges, which Tehran denies.

Haitham met with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi to discuss issues such as Tehran's strained ties with Egypt and Iran's disputed nuclear program, Iranian state media reported.

The visit comes as Iran also faces renewed criticism of its human rights record and allegations that Russia is using Iranian drones in its war in Ukraine. Tehran denies supplying the drones for use in the war.

Efforts by six world powers to revive Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal have stalled since last September, amid growing Western fears about the clerical establishment's rapidly advancing nuclear program.

The deal, which Washington ditched in 2018 under then President Donald Trump, had imposed curbs on Iran's nuclear activities that extended the time Tehran would need to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear bomb, if it chose to do so. Iran denies ever seeking nuclear weapons.

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    Reuters

    Reuters is a news agency founded in 1851 and owned by the Thomson Reuters Corporation based in Toronto, Canada. One of the world's largest wire services, it provides financial news as well as international coverage in over 16 languages to more than 1000 newspapers and 750 broadcasters around the globe.

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