If the flag incident is true then this appears to be a copy-cat incident of an earlier siege that took place at the Egyptian consulate in Yemen.
Iranian hardliners storm UK embassy
By Najmeh Bozorgmehr in Tehran
Published: December 30 2008 22:30 | Last updated: December 30 2008 22:30
About 300 Iranian radicals stormed a British embassy building on Tuesday to protest at the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip, briefly occupying it and raising a Palestinian flag, Iranian media reported.
The move followed a speech this week by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, in which he urged all Muslims to help Palestinians in any way they could and criticised Arab states for not backing up Gazans.
Groups of Iranian students have staged protests outside the British embassy and the Egyptian Interests Section. But the storming of the British embassy’s residential and cultural compound marked the first time they had ventured into embassy territory.
The embassy confirmed that the radicals “trespassed” but added “the embassy is back into our control now”. It said all embassy staff were safe.
Protests outside embassies in Tehran are not unprecedented and usually happen in response to perceived assaults against Muslims, such as the 2006 publication of Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.
But the last time an embassy was seized was in 1980, when Iranian revolutionaries took over the US embassy and held 55 diplomats hostage for 444 days.
Iranian police intervened quickly to evict the radicals from the British embassy building. The embassy said it was “in touch with Iranian authorities”, without giving details.
Fars news agency, a voice for radical groups in Iran, reported that the protest against Britain and Egypt would continue. Tabnak, a news website close to conservatives, reported that groups were calling for the closure of Egyptian and Jordanian diplomatic missions.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3691f3fa-d...077b07658.html
By Najmeh Bozorgmehr in Tehran
Published: December 30 2008 22:30 | Last updated: December 30 2008 22:30
About 300 Iranian radicals stormed a British embassy building on Tuesday to protest at the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip, briefly occupying it and raising a Palestinian flag, Iranian media reported.
The move followed a speech this week by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, in which he urged all Muslims to help Palestinians in any way they could and criticised Arab states for not backing up Gazans.
Groups of Iranian students have staged protests outside the British embassy and the Egyptian Interests Section. But the storming of the British embassy’s residential and cultural compound marked the first time they had ventured into embassy territory.
The embassy confirmed that the radicals “trespassed” but added “the embassy is back into our control now”. It said all embassy staff were safe.
Protests outside embassies in Tehran are not unprecedented and usually happen in response to perceived assaults against Muslims, such as the 2006 publication of Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.
But the last time an embassy was seized was in 1980, when Iranian revolutionaries took over the US embassy and held 55 diplomats hostage for 444 days.
Iranian police intervened quickly to evict the radicals from the British embassy building. The embassy said it was “in touch with Iranian authorities”, without giving details.
Fars news agency, a voice for radical groups in Iran, reported that the protest against Britain and Egypt would continue. Tabnak, a news website close to conservatives, reported that groups were calling for the closure of Egyptian and Jordanian diplomatic missions.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3691f3fa-d...077b07658.html
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