The Qatar New Agency is reporting that Egyptian President Morsi has met with the Secretary-General of the French Muslim Brotherhood. According to the report:
January 03 (QNA) – Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy met this evening with Secretary-General of the Union of Islamic Organizations in France (UOIF) Ahmed Jaballah, the and Vice Chairman of the Egyptian Hope Society in France Abdul l-Rahim Al-Khouli. A press release issued by the Egyptian presidency said the meeting dealt with the situation of the Egyptian and Muslim communities in France as well as the official and popular efforts aimed to achieve positive integration of the Muslim minority in the Western society on the basis of respect for public order of the state on the one hand, and respect for the Islamic identity of the other.”
The UOIF is widely regarded as representing the Muslim Brotherhood in France. Fouad Alaoui and Lahj Breze took over the leadership of the UOIF in 1993 and were known as the “Bordelaise Clan”, a reference to the French town in which they met as students. They were generally regarded as more moderate than their predecessors Abdallah Ben Mansour and Ahmed Jaballah who have both served as officers of the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE), representing the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe. Foud Alaoui is also a FIOE officer. In June 2011, a post reported that the UOIF elected Ahmed Jaballah as its new President, replacing Fouad Alaoui who was elected to a four-year term in 2009 but resigned his post. An earlier post reported that Jaballah was identified as a member of the “Meeting of Muslim Scholars and Thinkers”, an organization sponsored by the Saudi Muslim World League. A post from last March discussed a UOIF condemnation of the recent shootings in France that echoes standard Global Muslim Brotherhood themes about terrorism.