Thaindian News

London, Dec 3 (IANS) The expelled British ambassador to Iran, Dominick Chilcott, has accused the Iranian government of supporting Tuesday’s storming of British embassy compounds by Iranian students.

“That sort of activity is only done with the acquiescence and the support of the state,” Xinhua quoted Chilcott as saying Friday.

The British envoy left Iran after a group of protesters broke into the British embassy compound and burned British flags in Tehran.

Just two days earlier, the Iranian parliament had passed a bill that gave the government two weeks to expel the British ambassador.

Chilcott said: “With the benefit of hindsight, it’s very clear that this (Tuesday’s incident) was a state-supported activity.”

British Foreign Secretary William Hague, following the storming of embassy in Iran, ordered immediate closure of the Iranian embassy in London Wednesday and asked all Iranian diplomats to leave Britain within 48 hours since then.

Chilcott also said that some Iranian official “may have underestimated the British response”.

“They probably didn’t expect us to send home the Iranian embassy in London and, reading between the lines, you can see in the way they have responded to that move, some remorse in having provoked it,” he added.

Iran has regretted the incident and described it as “unacceptable behaviour by a small number of protesters.”