British Embassy (Tehran)

Douglas Alexander Excerpts

Wednesday 30th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr William Hague)]

With permission, Mr Speaker, I should like to make a statement about events in Tehran.

Shortly after 3 o’clock Tehran time yesterday, approximately 200 demonstrators overran the city-centre compound of our embassy in Tehran. The majority of demonstrators were from a student Basij militia organisation. We should be clear from the outset that that is an organisation controlled by elements of the Iranian regime.

The demonstrators proceeded systematically to vandalise and loot the homes of staff located on the site and the ambassador’s residence. They destroyed furniture, stole property, including the personal possessions of our staff, and set fire to the main embassy office building.

Simultaneously, our second embassy compound at Gulhaq in north Tehran also came under attack, and staff homes there were also attacked and looted. Our staff immediately evacuated the buildings affected and took refuge in safe areas of the compound. It was not until yesterday evening that we received confirmation that the Iranian diplomatic police had belatedly assisted at both compounds, and that all our staff were accounted for.

I wish to pay a fulsome tribute to our ambassador and his staff, who throughout those hours of danger behaved with the utmost calm and professionalism and followed well developed contingency plans. The Prime Minister and I have spoken to him several times in the past 24 hours and passed on our thanks to the UK-based and locally engaged members of his team.

It will be obvious to the whole House and the whole world that these events are a grave violation of the Vienna convention, which states that a host state is required to protect the premises of a diplomatic mission against any intrusion, damage or disturbance. This is a breach of international responsibilities of which any nation should be ashamed.

It is true, of course, that relations between Britain and Iran are difficult, as they are to varying degrees between Iran and many other nations. We publicly differ with Iran over its nuclear programme and on human rights, and we make no secret of our views. We have been foremost among those nations arguing for peaceful legitimate pressure to be intensified on Iran in the light of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s “deep and increasing concern” about the Iranian nuclear programme, including its “possible military dimensions”.

But we should be absolutely clear that no difficulty in relations can ever excuse in any way or under any circumstances the failure to protect diplomatic staff and diplomatic premises. Iran is a country where Opposition leaders are under house arrest, where more than 500 people have been executed so far this year and where genuine protest is ruthlessly stamped on. The idea that the Iranian authorities could not have protected our embassy, or that this assault could have taken place without some degree of regime consent, is fanciful.

Yesterday, I called the Iranian Foreign Minister to protest in the strongest terms about the events and to demand immediate steps to ensure the safety of our staff and of both embassy compounds. He said that he was sorry for what had happened and that action would be taken in response. The Iranian chargé d’affaires in London was summoned to the Foreign Office to reinforce those messages, and Cobra met yesterday afternoon and again this morning with the Prime Minister in the chair.

The UN Security Council issued a statement condemning the attack on our embassy in the strongest terms and calling on the Iranian authorities to

“protect diplomatic and consular property and personnel”.

I am grateful for the strong statements of concern and support from the United States, the European Union, Germany, Poland, Russia, China and many other nations. I particularly wish to thank France for the robust support that it has given us in every way, and for the practical assistance and accommodation that it has provided to our staff in Tehran.

Throughout Europe, Iranian ambassadors have been summoned to receive strong protests. In the words of the Foreign Minister of Austria:

“With the attack on the British Embassy, Iran is now on the verge of placing itself completely outside of the framework of international law. If Iran thinks it can undermine European solidarity through such actions, it is wrong.”

I am grateful to our other friends in the region itself, and particularly to the United Arab Emirates for its practical help. I am grateful also to the Foreign Minister of Turkey for his prompt and helpful intervention in these matters last night.

The safety of our staff and of other British nationals in Iran is our highest priority. We have now closed the British embassy in Tehran. We have decided to evacuate all our staff, and as of the last few minutes, the last of our UK-based staff has now left Iran.

We will work with friendly countries to ensure that residual British interests are protected and that urgent consular assistance is available to British nationals. We advise against all but essential travel to Iran. At present, there are no indications that British nationals outside the embassy are being targeted in any way. Those requiring urgent consular assistance will receive help from other EU missions in Tehran.

But that clearly cannot be the end of the matter, and the next few paragraphs of my statement are not in the written version being circulated to the House, because the timing of this announcement had to be consistent with the safety of our staff.

The Iranian chargé in London is being informed now that we require the immediate closure of the Iranian embassy in London, and that all Iranian diplomatic staff must leave the United Kingdom within the next 48 hours. If any country makes it impossible for us to operate on their soil, they cannot expect to have a functioning embassy here. This does not amount to the severing of diplomatic relations in their entirety. It is action that reduces our relations with Iran to the lowest level consistent with the maintenance of diplomatic relations.

The House will understand that it remains desirable for British representatives to be in contact with Iranian representatives—for instance, as part of any negotiations about their nuclear programme or to discuss human rights—but it does mean that both embassies will be closed. We wish to make it absolutely clear to Iran and to any other nation that such action against our embassies and such a flagrant breach of international responsibilities is totally unacceptable to the United Kingdom.

Later today and tomorrow I will attend the meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels, when we will discuss these events and further action that needs to be taken in the light of Iran’s continued pursuit of a nuclear weapons programme.

As a permanent member of the UN Security Council and a leading member of the European Union, we are proud of the role that our country plays in maintaining international peace and security and in standing up for human rights all over the world. If the Iranian Government think that we will be diverted from those responsibilities by the intimidation of our embassy staff, they will be making a serious mistake.

[Mr Douglas Alexander (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (Lab)]

I thank the Foreign Secretary for his statement and for allowing me advance sight of it. It is indeed right that we address the issues of the assault on the British embassy in Tehran along with other important business before the House today.

I, of course, begin by expressing my clear and unequivocal condemnation of the deplorable attacks that we witnessed yesterday in Tehran, and associate all Opposition Members with the words yesterday of the Foreign Secretary and of the Prime Minister on the issue.

Let me deal with the welfare of the UK diplomatic staff. I commend the British ambassador and his whole team on their handling of the situation and the unyielding professionalism and, indeed, bravery that they have shown at this extremely difficult time. Our thoughts are also with the staff and the families who were affected by yesterday’s assaults. Are appropriate steps being taken to safeguard locally engaged staff who have supported UK-based staff during the period in which the British embassy in Tehran has been operational?

With regard to responsibility for the assault, the Iranian Government clearly failed to take adequate measures to protect our embassy, our staff and our property. Their international responsibilities, including those under the Vienna convention, are well established. The demonstrations were co-ordinated, not coincidental, and the suggestion that the regime, or at least elements within it, were unaware of some of the actions stretches credulity. I welcome the right hon. Gentleman’s confirmation that he immediately summoned the Iranian chargé d’affaires to the Foreign Office yesterday and the condemnation issued by our colleagues in the European Union and the UN Security Council.

Let me turn to the context and consequences of yesterday’s events. The backdrop was the unequivocal International Atomic Energy Agency report published earlier this month, which made it clear that there is accumulating evidence for the possible military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear programme. In response to the report, the UK, along with Canada and the United States, sought to increase peaceful diplomatic pressure on Iran, and only last week the Chancellor announced the severing of all ties with Iranian banks, including the Central Bank of Iran. As a result of these measures, the Iranian Parliament approved a Bill three days ago requiring Iran and Britain to withdraw their ambassadors and downgrade the status of the two countries’ diplomatic ties.

That was the immediate context of yesterday’s assault, but what about the consequences? As we have just heard, British diplomats are thankfully on their way home and the embassy has been closed. The Foreign Secretary has just informed the House that, in response to the events, the Iranian chargé d’affaires has been told to leave the UK and Iran’s embassy in London will be closed forthwith. The safety and security of UK diplomatic staff and other UK nationals must be a paramount consideration, but can the Foreign Secretary set out how dialogue will be maintained in the light of these developments? If the effect of yesterday’s events is to extinguish dialogue—albeit that dialogue on human rights and the nuclear dossier is proving extremely difficult at present—the elements within the regime that seek conflict and confrontation would be strengthened. In the light of the diplomatic changes, what mechanisms for dialogue will remain open?

The Opposition agree that Britain’s national interest is best served by pursuing a twin-track approach to Iran and its nuclear ambitions, so will the Foreign Secretary be a little clearer when he responds on how the first part of that approach, the engagement strategy, will continue in the light of the downgrading of diplomatic relations? Does he agree that, notwithstanding yesterday’s truly deplorable assault on the embassy, a clear-eyed sense of Britain’s national interest would resist in the weeks ahead a descent into ever more bellicose rhetoric and instead seek to find new means of taking forward the difficult but necessary dialogue? Does he also agree that in that dialogue we must be clear that such deplorable assaults on our embassy will not and must not alter our determination to take forward the diplomatic work with others in the international community to ensure that Iran upholds its responsibilities and obligations under international law?

Finally, will the Foreign Secretary consider returning to the House in the weeks or months ahead to make a more wide-ranging statement on Iran in calmer times and the approach that the Government now intend to take, given not only the immediate events and their consequences, which he has rightly come to the House to address, but the stalled progress on the E3 plus 3 process and the growing anxiety about Iran’s nuclear ambitions?

[Mr Hague]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, who has joined in the condemnation of these completely unacceptable acts and the commendation of our ambassador and his staff. He asked about the locally engaged staff. Other than security staff, locally engaged staff were not in the embassy compound yesterday because, in anticipation of the demonstrations, we had asked them not to come to work, so they were not involved in the violence and danger. We will, of course, look after them financially and have a continuing concern for their welfare, although it must be pointed out that, as former Foreign Secretaries will remember, our locally engaged staff in Tehran have unfortunately always been at some degree of risk because of previous unacceptable behaviour by the Iranian regime.

The right hon. Gentleman is right to remind us of the wider context of the IAEA report and the action the Chancellor announced last week to sever financial links between our financial institutions and those of Iran. He asked how dialogue is to be maintained. Clearly these events make that more difficult. We do not take such decisions at all lightly, but after the events we have come to the conclusion that no assurance the Iranian regime could deliver on the safety of our staff could be believed. We have an overriding duty of care for those staff.

It is still possible in other forums to pursue dialogue with Iran where appropriate and meaningful. We are part of the E3 plus 3 process—the six nations that wish to negotiate with Iran over its nuclear programme—as is the United States, which does not have an embassy in Tehran. We meet the Iranians at various multilateral forums and organisations. I met the Iranian Foreign Minister at the UN General Assembly earlier this year. As I have said, we are not advocating the severing of all diplomatic relations. It is important that dialogue about these issues can continue, but it is not possible to maintain an embassy under these circumstances and in the light of these threats and actions.

The right hon. Gentleman asked about bellicose rhetoric. Of course, that is something that comes from Iran, not the United Kingdom. We heard that on Sunday in the Iranian Parliament there were chants of, “Death to Britain”, and it is unimaginable that we would ever treat any country in that way in our deliberations here in the House of Commons. It is the bellicose rhetoric coming from Iran that should come to an end. I am of course open to making other statements to the House in future and more wide-ranging considerations of our future policy towards Iran.