Mursi to urge Obama to free blind sheikh in first U.S. state visit.

Mursi to urge Obama to free blind sheikh in first U.S. state visit.(AA).The release of an Egyptian blind sheikh, jailed in the United States for the 1993 World Trade Center attack, will be urged by Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi during his upcoming visit to the U.S., the leader said on Monday
The announcement follows his pledge during his presidential campaign earlier this year to free Omar Abdul Rahman, currently serving a life sentence, in what had appeared to be gesture to Gama’a al-Islamiya, a Salafi group.
Sheikh Rahman, a preacher imprisoned in the United States in the 1990s for plotting attacks in New York, is the spiritual leader of Gama’a al-Islamiya, which was involved in the 1981 assassination of President Anwar Sadat but renounced violence in 1997. The group has entered mainstream politics since former President Hosni Mubarak was toppled.
Rahman, or the Blind Sheikh, is the former leader of the radical “Islamic Group” in Egypt, which now holds 13 seats in the Egyptian Parliament. The Obama administration recently hosted a member of the designated terrorist organization at the White House, where Hani Nour Eldin met with senior State Department and Obama administration officials. Eldin reportedly urged the National Security Council to release Rahman during his visit, the analyst explained.
In September, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland stressed there was no plan to release him following his trial and conviction.
Mursi told CNN in an interview aired Monday that he was hoping to travel to the United States before the end of March 2013, and he planned to raise the case of Sheikh Rahman with U.S. President Barack Obama.
"There is no set date yet, but it will most likely be before the end of the first quarter of this year," Mursi said.
It will be the Islamist leader's first visit to the United States since he was elected last year after the overthrow of long-time Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak.
Relations between the United States and its key regional ally, Egypt, have been complicated since Mursi's election with Washington treading carefully amid a series of controversial and widely criticized moves by Mursi.
Mursi repeated his view of the blind sheikh saying: "I want him to be free." But he added: "I respect the law. And the rule of law in Egypt and the United States."
If the ailing and ageing Abdul Rahman cannot be freed, then Mursi suggested he should be allowed visitation rights with his family and children.
"Is there a chance for him to be freed? I wish this," Mursi said, but if not then "Egypt's relationship with America deserves that these issues be reviewed, if that is okay according to the law.Hmmm......Benghazi didn't work out so well lets try a different way.Read the full story here.