Britain will pay the price for its attitude toward Iran

TEHRAN , Dec. 4 (MNA)-- Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Ramin Mehmanparast, who attended the welcome ceremony of Iranian diplomats arrived in the Iranian capital in the early hours of Saturday , commented on Britain’s move to expel Iranian diplomats and said, “Britain will pay the price for its inappropriate attitude toward the Iranian nation over the past 100 years.” He added, “The Iranian nation is cultured and civilized, and we pursue all issues through legal channels and international regulations. They (the United States and Israel) are seeking to produce documents to accuse Iran of flouting the law and depict the country’s internal situation as insecure and provoke embassies to review their ties with us, and we must show that this is not the case. We will not allow them to (create) discord among our people.” After the Iranian parliament approved a bill “mandating that Iran-Britain relations be downgraded, this country’s officials felt humiliated, and hastily tried to” divert attention from the parliamentary ratification, he stated. The Guardian Council approved a bill to downgrade ties with the British government ratified by the Iranian Majlis on November 28. Mehmanparast added, “They (the West) intend to depict Iran as the main threat. They want to give the impression that we are the cause of insecurity and instability and the (country) to blame for terrorist actions. And, through the exertion of pressure, they prepared the (International Atomic Energy) Agency’s report in a way that it expresses concern about Iran’s activities, and all this are meant to advance the Iranophobia project with the aim of diverting attention from their stance toward regional developments and creating discord among other countries in the Middle East region and us. This is a conspiracy.” IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano released a report on Iran’s nuclear program on November 8, in which he claimed that Iran appears to have worked on designing an atomic bomb. Elsewhere in his remarks, Mehmanparast commented on the victory of Islamists in the elections held in Tunisia and Egypt, noting, “This issue has intimidated the Americans and the Zionists, and we should not allow their plans in the region to create diversion in the movement of nations. We, through wisdom and tact, should not allow them to exploit (the situation).”