A photograph taken on October 29, 2024, exhibits an exterior view of the Iranian Embassy in Berlin, Germany, a day after Iran executed 69-year-old German-Iranian Sharmahd, who was sentenced to dying in February 2023 for the capital offense of “corruption on Earth.” Iran’s International Minister Abbas Araghchi on October 29 lambasted remarks by his German counterpart International Minister Baerbock criticizing Iranian authorities over the execution of twin nationwide Jamshid Sharmahd. On October 29, Berlin summoned Iran’s cost d’affaires to “convey its robust protest in opposition to the actions of the Iranian regime.” (Picture by John Macdougall / Agence France-Presse)
BERLIN — Germany will shut the three Iranian consulates on its soil in response to the execution of German-Iranian Jamshid Sharmahd, International Minister Annalena Baerbock stated Thursday.
“Now we have repeatedly and unequivocally made it clear to Tehran that the execution of a German citizen may have severe penalties,” Baerbock stated, asserting the closure of the consulates in Frankfurt, Munich, and Hamburg in a televised announcement.
The execution, introduced on Monday, had already provoked tit-for-tat diplomatic protests, with Chancellor Olaf Scholz calling it a “scandal.”
“The truth that this assassination passed off within the gentle of the most recent developments within the Center East exhibits that (Iran’s) dictatorial, unjust regime… doesn’t act in response to regular diplomatic logic,” Baerbock stated.
“It isn’t with out cause that our diplomatic relations are already at an all-time low,” she stated.
Article continues after this commercial
The closures will have an effect on a complete of 32 consular workers, in response to the international ministry.
Article continues after this commercial
READ: Iran’s secret service accused of plots to kill Jews in Europe
The Iranian International Ministry responded Thursday night, denouncing the “irrational resolution” that “can’t be justified,” and stated it had summoned Berlin’s ambassador to Tehran to convey Iran’s “robust protest.”
Baerbock didn’t point out Iran’s embassy in Berlin however stated Germany would “proceed to take care of our diplomatic channels and our embassy in Tehran.”
Amongst different causes, this was needed to ensure that the federal government to proceed to press for the discharge of the opposite German residents whom “the regime is unjustly detaining,” she stated.
Sharmahd, 69, had been sentenced to dying in February 2023 for the capital offense of “corruption on Earth,” a sentence later confirmed by the Iranian Supreme Courtroom.
He had been convicted of enjoying a job in a 2008 mosque bombing within the southern metropolis of Shiraz, by which 14 individuals have been killed and 300 wounded.
His household have lengthy maintained that Sharmahd was harmless and Amnesty Worldwide stated he had been the sufferer of a “present trial.”
However Iran has defended his execution and declared that “a German passport doesn’t present impunity to anybody, not to mention a terrorist legal.”
READ; Israel and Iran commerce expenses of endangering Center East peace
Germany can also be understood to be pushing for additional sanctions in opposition to Iran on the EU stage.
“In Brussels I’ve been pushing for the Revolutionary Guards to be listed as a terror organisation,” Baerbock stated on Thursday.
The EU’s high diplomat Josep Borrell earlier this week stated the bloc condemned Sharmahd’s “killing within the strongest attainable phrases” and was “contemplating measures in response.”
Sharmahd, a German citizen of Iranian descent and a US resident, was a software program engineer who had labored and written for an Iranian opposition group’s web site based mostly overseas that strongly criticised the Islamic republic’s management.
Your subscription couldn’t be saved. Please attempt once more.
Your subscription has been profitable.
He was seized by Iranian authorities in 2020 whereas travelling by means of the United Arab Emirates, in response to his household.
