Tehran, October 07: Iran’s Majlis speaker says Tehran will lodge a complaint to international circles and the United Nations against US ‘illegal and criminal’ attitude towards Iranian diplomats held in Iraq.
“The US committed criminal acts by exerting pressure on Iranian diplomats and keeping them in solitary prison for a lengthy period of time,” said Ali Larijani in a Tuesday meeting with diplomats who were released some three months ago after being kept in Iraq under US custody without charge.
“Iran’s Majlis and the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission will certainly pursue the case by lodging a complaint to the UN,” he added.
“The global system allows the US to violate all international regulations.”
In January 2007, US troops stormed the Iranian consulate in the northern Kurdish city of Arbil, seizing the consulate’s computers, documents and staff, including five diplomats. Two diplomats were later released.
The three remaining diplomats were released in July 2009 after two and a half years in prison, in line with the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) between the US and Iraq.
Under the terms of the agreement, the US military had to deliver more than 1,500 prisoners including the non-Iraqi nationals in its custody to the Baghdad government.
At the time, US authorities claimed the men were accused of arming and training Iraqi militants but the Iranian diplomats were never charged.
—–Agencies