Rachid Ghannouchi, the leader of the Islamist Ennahda Party, speaks during a news conference in Tunis October 28, 2011 (Photo: Reuters)
A spokesman for Egypt's newly-inaugurated President Mohamed Morsi on Monday denied reports that Morsi's son had delivered a gift to Rached Al-Ghannouchi, head of Tunisia's Islamist Al-Nahda movement, during the latter's recent visit to Cairo.
According to Al-Nahda's official website, Morsi's son, Osama, escorted Al-Ghannouchi to Cairo's international airport and gave him a necklace as a "token of appreciation" from his father.
Osama Morsi, however, later denied in a phone interview with satellite news channel CBC that he had accompanied Al-Ghannounchi to the airport or given him gifts.
In an interview with German news agency DPA on Sunday, Al-Ghannouchi did not deny that he had received a "gift of appreciation" from Egypt's new president. He declined to elaborate on the issue, however, saying it was a "private" matter.
News of the incident has drawn fierce criticism from Morsi's detractors. On social-networking websites, many drew comparisons between the new president's son and Gamal Mubarak, son of deposed president Hosni Mubarak, who – before his father's ouster last year – had been widely suspected of entertaining presidential ambitions.
Al-Ghannouchi, head of Tunisia's ruling Al-Nahda Party, arrived in Cairo last Thursday. He delivered an address in Cairo's Tahrir Square the next day, where he congratulated the Brotherhood's Morsi for his electoral victory.
Morsi was officially sworn in as Egypt's first-ever democratically elected head of state on Saturday after beating electoral rival Ahmed Shafiq, Mubarak's last prime minister.
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