When radical Iranian students stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran 41 years ago and held dozens of American diplomats and embassy employees hostage, they violated international diplomatic norms and precipitated U.S. economic sanctions against Iran.
While the students released 14 hostages after a short time, they did not free 52 other Americans for well over a year after their capture.
Since then, Iran has continued to practice the most undiplomatic behavior toward other countries’ diplomats around the world — as U.S. Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo has said, “The regime’s brutality and amorality know no international boundaries.”
The Iranian regime arrested the British ambassador to Iran. This violates the Vienna Convention, which the regime has a notorious history of violating. We call on the regime to formally apologize to the UK for violating his rights and to respect the rights of all diplomats.
— Morgan Ortagus (@statedeptspox) January 11, 2020
The following are other examples, most of which are documented in a State Department report, Outlaw Regime: A Chronicle of Iran’s Destructive Activities (PDF, 20 MB).
– 2011: Manssor Arbabsiar, an Iranian American, was arrested and sentenced to 25 years in prison for conspiring with Iranian military officials to assassinate Adel al-Jubeir, then the Saudi ambassador to the United States, while he dined at a Washington restaurant.
– 2012: Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps–Quds Force (IRGC-QF) targeted Israeli diplomats in India in a New Delhi bomb attack that injured three Indian citizens and one Israeli. The following day in Bangkok, three IRGC-QF operatives targeting Israeli diplomats detonated explosives that injured one perpetrator and five innocent bystanders.
– 2015: The government of Uruguay expelled an Iranian diplomat for planning an attack near the Israeli Embassy in Montevideo, Uruguay.
– 2016: Kenyan authorities arrested two Iranian operatives and their Kenyan driver, employed by the Iranian Embassy in Nairobi, for running surveillance on the Israeli Embassy.
Earlier this year, Iranian authorities arrested and briefly detained Rob Macaire, the United Kingdom’s ambassador to Iran. Iranians accused Macaire of taking part in illegal demonstrations in Tehran protesting the accidental downing of a Ukrainian airliner by Iranian forces. The ambassador contends he was attending a vigil for the victims of the crash, Reuters reported. U.S. Department of State spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus called on Iran to apologize.
Iranian Diplomatic Infrastructure for Terrorism in the world
Source » ge.usembassy.gov