British ambassador returns from London, says dialogue with Iran is a necessity

February 8, 2020 - 12:6

TEHRAN - British Ambassador to Iran Rob Macaire, in a video message released on the embassy's Instagram page on Thursday, highlighted the importance of conducting more dialogue between Tehran and London to hammer out key issues.

The minister made the comments after returning from Britain.

"The existing key issues between the two countries show the necessity of conducting dialogue between Iran and Britain in order to make progress over the issues that are important for both nations," Macaire said while explaining about his meetings with London officials over the ways to handle the issues that seem to be important to both Iran and Britain.

"I recently came back to Tehran from London. It was an important trip which had been pre-planned. I held several meetings with the British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab and other senior officials in London over ways to improve the issues that are important for both Iran and Britain," he stated.

Macaire underscored that Britain's exit from the European Union will not have any negative impact on London's commitments to the JCPOA and INSTEX, a European mechanism for trade with Iran.

"Regarding the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), we want to cooperate with Iran along with France, Germany, Russia and China to utilize the triggering dispute mechanism to find a way forward to be capable of settling international concerns over Iran's nuclear program as well as Tehran's concerns over benefiting from the deal's economic concessions," the envoy pointed out.

In mid-January, media sources reported that Macaire had left Tehran. It was announced at the time that the envoy’s departure had been previously announced to the relevant bodies.

The ambassador’s travel to Britain attracted much attention because he had been temporarily detained on January 11 for participating at a gathering of students in front of Amir Kabir University of Technology, who were protesting the accidental downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane near Tehran.

The Foreign Ministry also summoned him and called his behavior “unlawful”, “unprofessional”, “suspicious” and a violation of the 1961 Vienna convention.