During a meeting with European diplomats, a senior Iranian Foreign Ministry official reiterates the Islamic Republic’s readiness to cooperate with European countries in fighting terrorism.
The meeting took place among the official, Norwegian and Swedish ambassadors to Tehran, and Denmark’s chargé d'affaires, the Ministry reported on its website on Sunday.
“At the meeting, it was announced that Iran was ready for comprehensive and expansive cooperation, including in security areas and implementation of joint fact-finding investigations, with the respective countries,” said Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi.
The meeting was called following an armed attack against a military parade in the southern Iranian city of Ahvaz on September 22. Claimed by the al-Ahvaziya terror group, the attack killed 25 people, including a four-year-old child.
The Ministry official “laid emphasis on the responsibility borne by the countries (Norway, Sweden, and Denmark) to confront terrorism,” Qassemi said. He also stressed “the unacceptability of [their] sheltering those who have officially claimed responsibility for the attack,” the spokesman added.
The gathering was also convened in the light of recent accusations leveled by Denmark against Iran of “plotting an assassination on the Danish soil,” and a similar previous accusation by France.
The meeting featured Tehran’s strong rejection of the accusations made against the country through “the Zionist regime [of Israel]’s machinations and devising of clumsy scenarios,” Qassemi said.
According to the spokesman, the issue of confronting terrorism was also a focus of an earlier meeting between the Netherlands’ ambassador and the Ministry’s deputy political director as well as recent phone calls between Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his German, French, Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish counterparts.
The Islamic Republic, Qassemi said, used the contacts to express preparedness towards identification of the terrorist elements, which had found havens across Europe.
The Dutch envoy Jacques Werner, meanwhile, said he had conducted the necessary coordination during the meeting concerning an upcoming visit to Iran by the Netherlands’ Deputy Foreign Minister Andre Haspels.
Haspels is to meet with Iranian officials, including his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araqchi, to address such issues as Tehran’s multi-lateral nuclear accord with world countries as well as regional and international affairs.