UK envoy under fire for calling Shiraz terrorist attack ‘incident’

UK Ambassador to Tehran Simon Shercliff has been rebuked on social media for failing to recognize the armed attack on the Shah Cheragh shrine, for which Daesh (ISIS) claimed responsibility, as a “terrorist attack.”

In a social media post on Monday afternoon, Shercliff expressed grief over “yesterday’s incidents in Shiraz” and offered his condolences to the families of the victims.

“Violence against people, in any form, has no justification,” he said via his account on X, formerly called Twitter, without acknowledging that the assault was a terrorist attack.

On Sunday evening, a terrorist started shooting at people in the Shah Cheragh holy shrine in the southern Iranian city of Shiraz, martyring at least two people and injuring several others.

He was arrested at the scene and handed over to investigators for interrogation. Ten suspects linked to the incident have also been arrested so far.

The Daesh terrorist group claimed responsibility for the terrorist attack.

Responding to Shercliff, Iranian Ambassador to Baku Seyed Abbas Mousavi said reducing terrorism to “violence” or “incident” is a typical behavior of Western officials, who “divide terrorism into good and bad.”

Mousavi, a former Foreign Ministry spokesman, further pointed out that while the British government terms knife fights in London as “terrorist” attacks, it “turns a blind eye to naked terrorism” in other countries.

Other X users also blasted the British envoy’s double standards. “Is there any place in the world where this is not called a terrorist act?” one user wrote.

Mousavi also reminded London of the Islamic Republic’s counter-terrorism campaign, from which European countries have considerably benefited.

“Remember that you would have been collecting corpses in the streets of London every day had it not been for our General Soleimani’s acts of bravery,” he said, pointing to Iran’s anti-terror hero who was assassinated by the United States in 2020.

SS