Mubarak will not attend the economic summit in Iran

The Iranian foreign minister, Kamal Kharazi, said yesterday that President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt will not take part in an economic summit to which he was invited to attend by the end of February in Iran.

Kharazi told journalists that "Mubarak will not attend, but a high ranking Egyptian delegation will attend."

Relations between Egypt and Iran which severed in 1979 witnessed great improvement in recent months when Iran talked about the possibility of resuming diplomatic relations. Kharazi said that "relations between Iran and Egypt are in the phase of restructuring," but he stressed " we need time and we should not hesitate."

On the other hand, diplomatic sources said yesterday that the Iranian foreign minister, Kamal Kharazi, will visit Lebanon this week in order to follow up the fate of four missing Iranian diplomats following an exchange operation of prisoners between the Hizbullah party and Israel. Kharazi told journalists "I hope in the second phase that a follow up committee will be formed to investigate over the fate of four Iranian diplomats and for that reason I will visit Lebanon." The spokesman for Kharazi, Hamid Rida Asefi, said that this visit will take place this week.

Tehran played an active role in the agreement between Hizbullah and Israel, according to which Israel released on Thursday 400 Palestinians and 30 Arabs including 23 Lebanese and one German, and Israel handed over the remains of 60 Palestinian and Lebanese fighters in return for Hizbullah's release of the Israeli colonel in Reserve al-Hannan Tananbaum and the remains of three soldiers it held since October 2000.

Hizbullah said that it is likely that the four Iranians who were missed in north Lebanon since the Israeli invasion in 1982 to have been delivered for the Israelis by the militias of the Christian Lebanese forces.