However, the European and British envoys used their speaking time to push back strongly against the minister’s account, voicing outrage over what Britain’s Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper called the “brutal repression” of protests.
“The ambassadors forcefully expressed their concerns” during the Monday meeting, a spokesperson for France’s foreign ministry said in a statement.
The closed-door meeting in Tehran was part of a piecemeal but escalating European response to the crackdown on protests, in which at least 2,571 people have been killed, according to the U.S.-based HRANA rights group.
Speaking to journalists in India, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said the Islamic regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was “finished,” adding that “we are now witnessing the final days and weeks of this regime.” Several EU countries, including Spain, France, Belgium, Czechia and the Netherlands, have summoned Iranian ambassadors to condemn the violence.
Germany and the Netherlands are now pushing to get the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) listed as a terror organization in the EU, according to statements from the German and Dutch foreign ministers.
That comes after EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said she will soon propose fresh sanctions against the Islamic Republic. The proposal for new sanctions will be put forward at a gathering of European foreign ministers in Brussels on Jan. 29, an EU official said.