Iran awaiting ‘necessary conditions’ to reopen vandalized Syria embassy
Foreign Ministry says safety of staff must be ensured before it can reestablish its mission, which was ransacked when rebels ousted allied Assad regime
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran’s foreign ministry said on Tuesday that its embassy in Syria would reopen once the “necessary conditions” are met, after the diplomatic mission was vandalized following the ouster of Tehran ally Bashar al-Assad.
“The reopening of the embassy in Damascus requires preparations, the most important of which is ensuring the security and safety of the embassy and its staff,” said foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei.
He added that work to that end will be pursued “as soon as the necessary conditions are provided,” without offering a specific timeline.
The Iranian embassy in Damascus was ransacked after diplomats abandoned it as rebel forces seized the capital and ousted Assad.
Iran had supported Assad throughout Syria’s civil war, which began in 2011.
Since his fall, Iran has sought to distance itself from the deposed leader, instead emphasizing the history of friendship between the two countries.
Baqaei said on Tuesday that Iran’s “advisory” presence in Syria was “at the invitation of the government.”
“We were never in Syria to support a specific person, group or party,” he said.
“Our presence in Syria was fundamental and principled, and our withdrawal was responsible.”
Baqaei also said that Israel, which has conducted hundreds of airstrikes in Syria since Assad’s fall and sent troops into a UN-patrolled buffer zone, “severely violated Syria’s territorial integrity.”
Israel says the strikes are to prevent strategic weapons from falling into the hands of hostile elements.
On Monday, EU foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas said Russia and Iran “should not have a place” in war-torn Syria now that Assad is gone.
Baqaei slammed the remarks as a “joke,” adding that the era of foreign powers “trying to dictate (policies) on another region is over.”
Last week an Iranian official told Reuters that Tehran had opened a direct line of communication with Syria’s new leaders in an attempt to “prevent a hostile trajectory” between the countries.
On Sunday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that US officials have also been in contact with the rebel leadership. The rebels are led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, which is designated a terrorist organization by the US and the European Union, as well as some other countries.
An AFP photographer reported last week on the vandalism at the Iranian embassy.
The photographer saw ransacked offices, with shattered glass on the floor and broken furniture in the building in Damascus’s upscale Mazzeh area, also home to other embassies and United Nations offices.
People loaded looted items onto trucks outside, the photographer said.
Filing cabinets and drawers sat open while papers, files, and other contents, including Iranian and Syrian flags, were strewn around the premises.
A safe sat in the middle of one room, whose tiled floor was littered with broken posters including of the Islamic Republic’s founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and current supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the AFP photographer saw.
Also on the ground was a destroyed picture of Lebanon’s former Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, killed in an Israeli strike in Beirut’s southern suburbs in September, and of Iranian Revolutionary Guards commander Qasem Soleimani, who died in a US drone strike in the Iraqi capital Baghdad in January 2020.
“Unknown individuals have attacked the Iranian embassy, as you can see in these images shared by various networks,” an Iranian state television broadcaster said at the time, showing footage from Al Arabiya, said to be from the diplomatic compound.
Iranian newspaper Tehran Times reported online that Iranian diplomats had left the embassy before it was stormed, citing foreign ministry spokesman Baqaei.
The report accused rebel forces of being behind the attack, a claim that could not be independently verified immediately.
Baqaei said in a statement at the time that Tehran has taken the “necessary measures” to ensure the “security and safety of the employees of the embassy.”
He added that “the ambassador and employees are in perfect health.”
