Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: anche questa e' una tradizione

Protesters Storm British Embassy in Tehran
 
By ALAN COWELL and RICK GLADSTONE
 
LONDON — Dozens of Iranian protesters screaming “death to England!”
stormed the British embassy compound in Tehran on Tuesday, tore down
the British flag and ransacked the offices, according to officials in
London, Iranian news dispatches and images broadcast live on Iranian
state television.
 
The assault came a day after Iran’s Islamic leaders moved to downgrade
relations with Britain because of harsh financial sanctions imposed by
the West — and Britain in particular — over Iran’s suspect nuclear
program, and it appeared to be the most serious diplomatic breach
between the two countries in more than 20 years of troubled relations.
 
There were conflicting accounts of whether any hostages were taken in
the embassy assault, which appeared to be an orchestrated event
sanctioned by the Iranian authorities. Iran’s semi-official Mehr news
agency said six people from the embassy were seized by Iranian
students from Tehran universities but inexplicably withdrew the report
minutes later.
 
The whereabouts of the embassy staff at the time of the assault were
not clear.
 
Britain’s Foreign Office, apparently caught off guard by the assault,
called the it “utterly unacceptable” and said British officials had
spoken to Iranian diplomats in London “to urge the Iranian authorities
to act with utmost urgency to ensure the situation is brought under
control and to protect our diplomatic compound, as they are obliged to
do under international law.”
 
The Foreign Office also urged all British nationals in Iran “to stay
indoors, keep a low profile and await further advice.”
 
Iranian news agencies said about 50 protesters invaded the offices of
the vast walled compound housing the British Embassy and its manicured
grounds, situated in a busy neighborhood in the heart of Tehran, and
that 200 to 300 student protesters rallied outside.
 
It appeared to be the most serious violence targeting the British
embassy in Tehran since relations were restored in 1990 following a
breach caused by Iranian outrage over the 1988 publication of the “The
Satanic Verses” by the Indian-British novelist Salman Rushdie, which
caused a furor in the Islamic world because it was considered
sacrilegious.
 
It was not clear if the embassy assault was supposed to mirror the
storming of the American Embassy on Nov. 4, 1979, that led to the
continuing breach in diplomatic relations with Washington. But Iran’s
post-1979 revolutionary leaders have always harbored a special
antipathy toward Britain, commonly regarded as the older cousin of the
United States.
 
A day before the embassy assault, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei, singled out Britain in a speech as an icon of Western
imperialist arrogance, saying it “has a history of humiliating
nations, destroying cultural and civilization heritage and taking
control of their resources.”
 
The Associated Press identified the embassy assailants as hard-line
Iranian students, who were said to have burst into the building and
thrown documents from windows. They also chanted: “The embassy of
Britain should be taken over!”
 
Portions of the episode was shown live on Iranian television. The
invaders threw stones at windows, and one was seen climbing over the
high wall around the compound with an apparently looted portrait of
Queen Elizabeth II. While some reports said the protesters clashed
with riot police, other accounts said the authorities did nothing to
prevent the attack.
 
Many of the protesters gathered outside were demanding the immediate
departure of the British ambassador. Images on state-run Press TV
showed protesters milling about in what seemed to be an embassy
courtyard while one person addressed them through a bull-horn.
 
Demonstrators waved flags symbolizing martyrdom and held up portraits
of Ayatollah Khamenei, Reuters reported, adding that a separate
British diplomatic office had also been attacked by demonstrators who
seized what the state IRNA news agency called “classified documents.”
 
While Iranian riot police were reported to have stood by during the
incursions, officers climbed the embassy gates to help protesters get
back to the street, television pictures showed, according to Reuters.
Then they began to slowly move the demonstrators away.
 
The moves against Britain’s diplomatic representation followed action
on Monday by the Guardian Council, an Iranian clerical body that has
oversight on bills passed by Parliament, which unanimously endorsed a
bill approved on Sunday to expel the ambassador and downgrade
diplomatic contacts.
 
The council determined that the legislation was “not in violation of
Islamic principles or articles of the Iranian constitution,” the Fars
news agency quoted a council spokesman as saying.
 
The United States and the European Union imposed harsher sanctions on
Iran on Nov. 21 after the United Nations nuclear monitoring agency
released a report on Nov. 8 that said Iran might be working on a
nuclear weapon and missile delivery system.
 
Iran has denied those accusations and insists that its nuclear program
is peaceful. It has called the United Nations report a false and
shameful propaganda display done at the behest of the United States
and its allies.
 
The sanctions imposed by Britain were considered the most severe
because they required that all contacts with the Iranian Central Bank
be severed, a step that other countries, including the United States,
did not take.
 
Alan Cowell reported from London, and Rick Gladstone from New York.
Artin Afkhami contributed reporting from Boston.
 
 
 
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/30/world/middleeast/tehran-protesters-storm-british-embassy.html?_r=1&emc=na
 

 Protesters Storm British Embassy in Tehran
 
A suo tempo l'UK l'ha fatto con molta più professionalità.
 
PP