Tehran has denounced Albania for expelling two Iranian diplomats, saying the Balkan country fell prey to a scenario fabricated by the US and Israel.
\nAlbania\u2019s Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday that it had expelled two Iranian diplomats suspected of \u201cinvolvement in activities that harm the country\u2019s security.\u201d
\nA ministry spokesman told the Associated Press that the expulsions followed talks with others, including Israel.
\nIran\u2019s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi said on Thursday that Albania\u2019s move was \u201cin line with previous such scenarios meant to damage Iran-Europe relations at the current sensitive juncture.\u201d
\nHe said the expulsions come while Tehran has \u201calways had appropriate relations with Albania and respected all of its domestic regulations in a move based on principles of the Islamic Republic of Iran\u2019s foreign policy.\u201d
\nUS National Security Adviser John Bolton was quick to publicly support Albania\u2019s decision.
\n\u201cWe stand with PM [Edi] Rama and the Albanian people as they stand up to Iran\u2019s reckless behavior in Europe and across the globe,\u201d he tweeted.
\nQassemi said that Washington\u2019s stance on the issue and Albania\u2019s declaration that its move had been coordinated with foreign security services, prove that the US and the regime in Israel had been behind the expulsions.
\nAlbania, he added, had fallen prey to a scenario fabricated by the US and the Israeli regime and certain terrorist groups.
\nThe Iranian official further called on the Albanian government \u201cto defend its sovereignty, independence and security\u201d in the face of the US-Israeli scenario,\u201d stressing that the country \u201cmust not allow others to affect and hamper its relations with Iran due to special political reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n
Albania has expelled Iran\u2019s ambassador and another diplomat for \u201cdamaging its national security.\u201d
\nWorth nothing that Albania houses the MEK, an Iranian cult seeking regime change in Tehran. https:\/\/t.co\/KAcltD3YvD
\n\u2014 Holly Dagres (@hdagres) December 20, 2018<\/p><\/blockquote>\nAlbania hosts thousands of members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO), a notorious anti-Iran terror group.
\nThe MKO has carried out numerous attacks against Iranian civilians and government officials over the past three decades and is listed as a terrorist organization by much of the international community.
\nOut of the nearly 17,000 Iranians killed in terrorist assaults since the victory of Iran\u2019s 1979 Islamic Revolution, about 12,000 have fallen victim to MKO\u2019s acts of terror.
\nAlbania is not the first European country to make such claims against Iran.
\nBack in June, Belgian authorities said that an Iranian diplomat had been arrested along with a 38-year-old man and a 33-year-old woman, suspected of plotting a bomb attack on an MKO meeting in Paris attended by US President Donald Trump\u2019s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, and several former European and Arab ministers.
\nAssadollah Assadi, 46, was arrested in Germany and later extradited to Belgium in defiance of Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961.<\/p>\nLater on October 30, Danish intelligence chief Finn Borch Andersen claimed that an Iranian intelligence service had tried to carry out a plot to assassinate an Iranian Arab opposition figure on Denmark\u2019s soil.
\nSwedish security police also said a Norwegian citizen of Iranian descent had been arrested on October 21 in connection with the alleged plot and extradited to Denmark.
\nIsraeli media later revealed that the Israeli spy agency Mossad had provided Denmark with \u201cintelligence\u201d concerning the alleged plot by Tehran.
\nIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has admitted that Tel Aviv is behind what Iranian Foreign Minister described as \u201cfalse flags\u201d in Europe.
\nTehran said \u201cinvisible hands\u201d were at work to damage Iran\u2019s ties with Europe at the time when the two sides are closely cooperating to save the 2015 multilateral nuclear deal following the US\u2019s pullout.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Albania\u2019s move was \u201cin line with previous such scenarios meant to damage Iran-Europe relations at the current sensitive juncture.\u201d .US National Security Adviser John Bolton was quick to publicly support Albania\u2019s decision. \u201cWe stand with PM [Edi] Rama and the Albanian people as they stand up to Iran\u2019s reckless behavior in Europe and across the globe,\u201d he tweeted \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8000,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[112,680,64],"module":[81],"ctype":[17],"blog":[25],"class_list":["post-9079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mujahedin-khalq-proxy-force","tag-hot-topics","tag-mko-members-in-albania","tag-mkos-terrorist-activities","module-article","ctype-story","blog-press-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9079"},{"taxonomy":"module","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/module?post=9079"},{"taxonomy":"ctype","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ctype?post=9079"},{"taxonomy":"blog","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/blog?post=9079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}