JEDDAH: The Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs has expressed its “fierce condemnation” of an attack on its embassy in Tehran Monday and said the Kingdom is treating the issue with the “utmost seriousness”. Osama Naqali from the ministry's media department said that the Kingdom held Iran “wholly responsible” for the security of the mission, and expressed his relief that no one was injured. “Diplomatic missions have immunity in accordance with international protocol and law and no party whatsoever should violate that immunity,” he said. “Iran is wholly responsible for protecting the Saudi mission on its land, as it is for other diplomatic missions there. Iran is entirely responsible for any material or moral damage resulting from what occurred at the embassy.” He noted his concern that “the only demonstrations permitted in Iran are the ones against the Saudi mission”. “The Kingdom is studying the options open to it to halt these actions against its mission, the consequences of which will lie fully with the Iranian government,” Naqali said. Sources told Okaz/Saudi Gazette that the embassy had prior knowledge of the demonstration and had vacated its staff as a precaution. The only persons at the embassy at the time were security staff. “Demonstrators began throwing stones at the embassy as Iranian security officials looked on,” the sources said. “They did not arrest any demonstrators who attacked the embassy, in contrast to what occurs when there are other demonstrations in Iran. That provokes the question of whether there was collusion between Iranian security forces and the demonstrators.” The sources added that the incident was “not the first time such a thing has happened”. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a similar denouncement last month after some 700 people stoned the Saudi Consulate in the city of Mashhad in northeastern Iran.
