Iran FM censures lax security around embassy in Denmark after armed attack
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has lashed out at Denmark for failing to ensure the security of the Islamic Republic’s embassy and ambassador in Copenhagen after an armed assailant broke into the diplomatic site.
In a phone call with Iranian Ambassador to Copenhagen Afsaneh Nadipour on Friday, Amir-Abdollahian said it is a shame that such an attack happens against a “female ambassador with diplomatic impunity in the heart of Europe.”
He also criticized the Danish police for their belated response to the intrusion.
The envoy then briefed the foreign minister on the circumstances surrounding the attack, saying, “After trespassing on the embassy’s premises, the assailant, carrying a cold weapon, started to threaten, terrorize and cause damage to the vehicles in the parking lot of the embassy.”
“Unfortunately, despite the previous official warnings, the Danish police arrived at the embassy with considerable delay,” Nadipour added.
Nationwide riots erupted after the death of a young Iranian woman last month. Anti-Iran rioters have also gathered in front of the Islamic Republic’s embassies and consulates in some cities around the world, with some clashes reported between them and host countries’ police.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry has summoned Sweden’s chargé d’affaires to protest an attack on the Iranian embassy in Stockholm.
The Swedish diplomat has been summoned to the Iranian Foreign Ministry in the absence of the ambassador to convey the Islamic Republic’s strong protest with regard to the Swedish police’s failure to take the fully required security measures in accordance with the Vienna Convention.
Meanwhile, the Foreign Ministry has also expressed its protest to Belgium over a similar attack on the Islamic Republic’s embassy in Brussels.
Protests over the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian woman who fainted at a police station and was pronounced dead at a Tehran hospital on September 16, erupted first in her native province of Kordestan and later in several cities, including the capital Tehran.
The protests soon turned into violent riots, with rioters going on the rampage across the country, attacking security officers, resorting to vandalism against public property, and desecrating religious sanctities.
Immediately after Amini’s death, Iranian President Ebrahim Raeisi ordered a thorough investigation into the case.
Iranian Intelligence Ministry announced last Friday that the rioters had been backed by Western regimes and their mercenary media, who disseminated misinformation and distorted the sequence of events that led to Amini’s death even before the official investigation into the incident concludes.
