VIENNA — Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday begins the second leg of his European tour seeking assurances over the 2015 nuclear deal, a trip clouded by the arrest of a Tehran diplomat over an alleged bomb plot against opposition exiles in Paris.
Rouhani first met President Alexander Van der Bellen on Wednesday and was later meeting with Chancellor Sebastian Kurz.
Rouhani’s visit follows reports of the Iranian diplomat’s arrest along with five others over a purported foiled attack on a rally of thousands of Iranian opposition supporters in Paris.
Rouhani has not changed his program over what his foreign minister dismissed as a “false flag ploy” designed as a distraction.
Just hours before welcoming Rouhani to Austria, Vienna summoned Iran’s ambassador and announced that the unnamed diplomat’s status would be withdrawn.
The diplomat attached to the Iranian embassy in Austria, who was detained in Germany, was believed to be a contact of a couple at the centre of the alleged plot.
He may soon be extradited to Belgium, which is spearheading a probe into the alleged bomb plot, prosecutors told the German news agency DPA.
— AFP
Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani (L) are seen before a meeting at the Chancellery in Vienna on July 4, 2018. (AFP Photo/APA/Robert Jaeger)
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