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President Mubarak of Egypt at the White House

August 19, 2009 at 2:30 PM ET by Kori Schulman

Summary:

Yesterday President Obama welcomed President Mubarak of Egypt to the White House for the first time since taking office.

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Yesterday President Obama welcomed President Mubarak of Egypt to the White House for the first time since taking office. The Presidents first met in Cairo where President Obama delivered a speech on America's relationship with Muslim communities around the world.

The President emphasized the longstanding partnership between the United States and Egypt and the work that must be done together to "help advance the interest of peace and prosperity around the world."

He discussed common concerns and the work that is already being done to promote the interests of the American and Egyptian people:

The Arab-Israeli situation is something that has been of ongoing interest and we had an extensive conversation about how we could help to jumpstart an effective process on all sides to move away from a status quo that is not working for the Israeli people, the Palestinian people, or, I think, the region as a whole.

We discussed our common concerns about the potential proliferation of nuclear weapons in the region, including the development of nuclear weapons by Iran, and how we could work together on those fronts. We discussed Iraq -- and I want to thank the government of Egypt for being an Arab country that has moved forward to try to strengthen Iraq as it emerges from a wartime footing and a transition to a more stable democracy.

And we continued to talk about how we can work together on economic development issues, education issues, health issues, that can promote the interests of both the American people as well as the Egyptian people. Just to take one example, we have agreed to work together with the Organization of Islamic States to eradicate polio, something that we've been able to successfully deal with here in the United States but still has impact on populations throughout the Muslim communities around the world.

And so these are the kinds of partnerships that we want to continue to build. There are some areas where we still have disagreements, and where we do have disagreements we have a frank and honest exchange.