UK summons Iran’s ambassador over Khamenei speech

LONDON — Britain’s Foreign Office said Friday it had told an Iranian diplomat it was concerned by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s criticism of Britain, which he called evil.

During Friday prayers at Tehran University, Khamenei accused the United States, Britain and what he called Iran’s other enemies of fomenting unrest. He singled out Britain for specific criticism.

“I will tell you the outstanding diplomats of some Western countries who talk to us with diplomatic courtesy up to now during the past few days have taken their masquerade away from their faces and they are showing their true image,” he said according to a translation provided by the BBC. “They are displaying their enmity against the Islamic state, and the most evil of them is the British government.”

Britain is one of the six nations involved in negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program. The West accuses Iran of seeking to develop nuclear weapons, a charge Iran denies.

The Foreign Office summoned the Iranian ambassador for talks, but said that, in the end, a more junior diplomat — the charge d’affaires, Safar Ali Eslamian Koupaei — attended a meeting with political director Mark Lyall Grant.

The Foreign Office said it was told the charge d’affaires was attending in the absence of the ambassador.

“We made clear to the Iranian charge that the supreme leader’s comments were unacceptable and had no basis in fact,” a Foreign Office spokesman said on condition of anonymity in line with policy.

Iran’s Embassy in London did not immediately respond to requests asking why the ambassador had not attended the meeting.

Diplomats in Britain and the U.S. say they have been measured in their comments on the recent election and subsequent protests, mindful of Iran’s accusation that they intrude unfairly in the country’s affairs.

“We want Iran to be part of the international community and not to be isolated,” British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Friday at a European Union summit in Brussels. “We are not asking the Iranian people that other countries should choose who they elect. We wish to protect the right of the Iranian people to elect who they wish.”

Britain’s ambassador to Iran has twice been called to meetings with officials in Tehran in recent days, on one occasion to receive a complaint about coverage of the country’s election by Britain’s national broadcaster, the BBC.