Prominent Egyptian Nasserist politician Hamdeen Sabahi visits Assad in Damascus

Prominent Egyptian pan-Arabist politician Hamdeen Sabahi led a delegation from the Arab National Congress (ANC) to meet Syrian regime leader Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday.

During the meeting, Assad and the Sabahi-led delegation discussed "Arabism... and the role of Arab parties towards the Arab street in light of the increased challenges and the Western intellectual invasion," according to an Assad regime statement.

Sabahi rose to fame as a devout follower of former Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser and his ideology of 'Arab socialism' in opposition to presidents Sadat and Mubarak as they moved towards the West. In 2012, he unsuccessfully stood in Egypt’s first and only democratic presidential election following the ousting of Mubarak by popular revolt the previous year.

Sabahi is currently the leader of the neo-Nasserist Egyptian Popular Current.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad received members of the Arab National Congress delegation, led by prominent Egyptian politician Hamdeen Sabahi. pic.twitter.com/nxoNpDIWPT

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In 2013, Sabahi controversially sided with the Egyptian military and its figurehead Abdel Fattah al-Sisi – who is now Egypt's president – as they brutally overthrew the late, democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi.

Sabahi went as far as supporting the Rabaa and Nadha massacres of peaceful pro-democracy protesters that human rights groups have designated as crimes against humanity by human rights groups, saying he supported the police and army against "terrorism".

The ANC purports to be a broad political framework bringing together a host of nationally oriented Arab political forces.

The meeting with Assad, which came after the ANC held its annual conference in Beirut on Sunday, was controversial even within the organisation itself. Sabahi had come under pressure not to visit Damascus, given several members of the ANC remain imprisoned by the Assad regime, according to The New Arab’s Arabic-language sister publication Al-Araby Al-Jadeed.

Sabahi defended his decision to meet with Assad in an interview with pro-Assad Lebanese outlet Al Mayadeen, saying that it was about "solidarity … against aggression, occupation and siege".

Sabahi and the ANC delegation’s visit to Assad comes as the dictator – whose brutal crackdown on peaceful protests led to the deaths of over 600,000 people and the displacement of 13 million Syrians – has been readmitted to the Arab League after a successful Emirati and Saudi-led campaign of regional normalisation.