A senior Iranian diplomat says the government is determined to uphold and safeguard the rights of Iranian nationals living abroad, vowing to use all capacities to prevent any violations of their rights.
Ali Bagheri Kani, the deputy foreign minister for political affairs, made the remarks on Wednesday during a meeting with a group of Iranians living in Budapest, Hungary.
The senior diplomat and the top nuclear negotiator arrived in the Hungarian capital on Tuesday, on the first leg of his tour-nation tour of Europe.
“The government does not tolerate violation of the rights of Iranians anywhere in the world,” he stressed, noting that it will use all its capacities as well as political and legal tools to safeguard the rights of its people.
Among the responsibilities of the foreign ministry with regard to Iranians living abroad, he emphasized, are supporting their rights, facilitating their constant relations with their home country, and following up on their problems.
As a “valuable, influential asset,” the Iranian diaspora can explain the realities of progress and development in the Islamic Republic of Iran, he added.
It comes as according to officials, some 3,800 Iranians are imprisoned outside their country, with some of them serving jail terms in inappropriate conditions.
Kazem Gharibabadi, the Iranian judiciary chief’s deputy for international affairs and secretary of the country’s High Council for Human Rights, mentioned the figure back in February, saying some of the charges are on political pretexts, including for circumventing illegal US sanctions.
Stressing that the duty of the administration in different sectors of the Islamic Republic is to defend the rights of such prisoners, the senior official said some of these Iranian prisoners are "not in good condition abroad and many problems have arisen as some of them are the heads of their families.”
In May, during his visit to Oman, Iran's President Ebrahim Raeisi stressed that Iranians all over the world are the "country's capital" and the government "feels responsible towards them".
"We believe that just as we must protect the rights of Iranians inside the country, we must protect the rights of Iranians abroad and support them as well," he told a group of Iranians living in Oman.