Oman’s sultan due in Tehran with Iran-Egypt détente on agenda

By Syed Zafar Mehdi

TEHRAN, Iran (AA) – Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq will arrive in Tehran on Sunday for his first visit since assuming power, a year after Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi toured the Arab country across the Strait of Hormuz.

Sultan Haitham, who replaced Sultan Qaboos bin Said in January 2020 on the throne, will be accompanied by a high-level delegation, including Foreign Minister Sayyid Badr bin Hamad Al Busaidi and other officials.

According to reports, the visit will focus on “promoting cooperation” between the two Persian Gulf neighbors and build on deals reached during Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s visit to Muscat in May last year.

However, Anadolu learned that Sultan Haitham will also be carrying messages from Egypt and the US for Iran as Muscat steps up its role as a mediator in line with its active neutrality in regional conflicts.

“The sultan’s visit to Tehran comes days after he visited Cairo and held talks with [President] Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, which is significant given Muscat-mediated efforts in recent months aimed at Iran-Egypt rapprochement,” an informed source in Tehran told Anadolu.

“Oman, which has close ties with both Tehran and Washington, has also been making hectic efforts to break the logjam over the 2015 nuclear deal talks and bring the US back into the agreement, so that will figure prominently in Sultan Haitham’s talks with Iranian officials.”

Pertinently, since Sultan Qaboos’s death in January 2020, his former top diplomat and successor has carried forward his legacy of being an effective mediator in regional conflicts, which was seen in the case of Iran and Saudi Arabia, Syria and its Arab neighbors, and even Riyadh and Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

Oman, in particular, played a low-key but instrumental role in helping regional rivals Tehran and Riyadh bury the hatchet and restore diplomatic ties after seven years.

-Iran-Egypt détente

Oman, a strategically located Arab country sitting at the confluence of the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea, has for long shown active neutrality in regional and global conflicts, maintaining close ties with Iran and other Persian Gulf countries.

More recently, Muscat, along with Iraq, helped Iran and Saudi Arabia revive their diplomatic ties even though the breakthrough came in Beijing after two years of marathon negotiations.

Tehran-Saudi détente paved the way for the restoration of ties between Iran and other Arab countries, including Egypt, with Oman again playing the role of a mediator between them.

Sultan Haitham’s visit to Tehran follows his trip to Cairo where he discussed with Sisi "overall regional and international developments," according to Oman's state news agency.

Iran, according to informed sources, featured prominently in discussions between the two leaders.

Speculation is rife about Iran and Egypt exchanging ambassadors soon, as well as the possibility of the two presidents meeting in the near future as Oman-mediated tension-easing talks bear results.

“Oman has done this quiet diplomacy for decades, mediating fence-mending talks between regional countries,” Ehsan Moqaddam, a Middle East affairs analyst, told Anadolu.

“The successful mediation of Iran-Saudi talks has raised the prospects of Iran-Egypt rapprochement too in the near future,” he said.

Although Iran’s relations with Egypt have been fraught since the 1979 Iranian revolution when Mohammad Reza Pahlavi sought refuge in the Arab country and eventually died there, the breakdown of Tehran-Riyadh ties in January 2016 complicated the situation.

The resumption of Iranian-Saudi ties also rekindled the hopes of Iran-Egypt rapprochement with a senior lawmaker earlier this month saying the two countries are “on track to restore ties”.

Oman has also been mediating talks between Saudi Arabia and Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen in a bid to end years of a devastating war.

Omani and Saudi representatives held talks with Houthis in Sanaa last month with both sides pushing for a permanent cease-fire.

The negotiations, brokered by Muscat, gained momentum following the March agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia to end the hostilities and resume diplomatic ties after seven years.

Earlier this month, Iran’s top military general Mohammad Baqeri met Sultan Haitham in Muscat and commended his government’s efforts in helping “preserve the territorial integrity of Yemen”.

-Iran nuclear deal

Besides its effective mediation in regional disputes and conflicts, Oman, due to its close ties with both Iran and the US, has also been involved in the de-escalation of Tehran-Washington tensions.

“Before Iran and the world powers signed the landmark nuclear deal in 2015 that put limits on Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for the removal of sanctions, Oman acted as a key diplomatic bridge between Iran and the US,” said Moqaddam.

The former US administration unilaterally walked out of the deal in May 2018 and restored sanctions on Iran.

Since April 2021, Iran and the US have been engaged in indirect talks in Vienna to revive the deal, but the negotiations were stalled in August last year over key disagreements between the main parties.

Last month, during his visit to Oman, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said Tehran and Muscat have held consultations on “reviving the nuclear deal and lifting the sanctions”.

He also appreciated Oman for playing a "constructive" role in the talks.

In February, after his meeting with the Iranian parliament’s foreign affairs commission, Amir-Abdollahian was quoted as saying by a senior lawmaker that Oman’s Sultan Haitham will visit Tehran with “good news” on the nuclear deal talks.

The lawmaker cited the top diplomat as saying that Omani authorities have expressed willingness to mediate between Iran and the US in reviving the stalled negotiations.

Oman, according to informed sources, is also engaged in helping Iran and the US finalize a prisoner swap agreement that has failed to make headway despite months of indirect negotiations.

-Trade ties

Sultan Haitham’s visit to Tehran comes a year after the two countries signed a series of memoranda of understanding in several fields, including energy, trade and investment.

Iran’s Ambassador to Muscat Ali Najafi said in statements cited by Oman’s state news agency ONA earlier this week that the visit will further strengthen cooperation between the two countries.

“In addition to historical, cultural and religious ties and commonalities, there is a broad prospect for promoting political, economic, international and regional cooperation between the two countries,” he added.

The diplomat said the volume of trade between Iran and Oman reached $2 billion in the past year, marking a 60% increase from last two years.

The two countries, according to reports, would be signing more cooperation agreements during the sultan’s visit as Iran looks to boost its exports to the Arab country.

Shahla Amouri, the deputy chairman of the Iran-Oman Joint Chamber of Commerce, said the value of Iran’s exports to Oman rose to $1.2 billion in the past year from $600 million in the year before.

There is also unconfirmed talk about the Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) between the two countries as well as the use of regional currencies in trade transactions, in place of the dollar.