Deputy Foreign Minister announced Azerbaijan Khalaf Khalafov today, Sunday, suspended the diplomatic operations of his country’s embassy in Tehran, after an attack that resulted in casualties two days ago.
Khalafov said in statements reported by the official AZERTAC agency that his country does not trust Iran to ensure the security of its embassy staff in Tehran, noting that the Azerbaijani consulate in the city of Tabriz will continue its work.
He also added that Iran bears responsibility as a state for the attack on his country’s embassy in Tehran and its “dire” consequences.
Irresponsible
And the Deputy Foreign Minister considered that Iran had acted “irresponsibly” after his country’s request to it to tighten security measures around the embassy in Tehran.
An attacker opened fire on the Azerbaijani embassy in Tehran last Friday, killing one person and wounding two others, in an attack that Tehran says had “personal” motives, while Baku described it as a “terrorist”.
And the police in Tehran announced the arrest of a person suspected of being linked to the attack that took place on Friday, and the Iranian authorities condemned them, but stated that the motives of the gunman appeared to be personal rather than political.
The attack occurred amid growing tensions between the two neighbors over Iran’s treatment of its large Azeri minority, and over Azerbaijan’s decision this month to appoint its first-ever ambassador to Israel.
