A newspaper close to Iran’s supreme leader said on Saturday that the country’s ambassador to the UK has been dismissed due to an “unconventional event” held at Tehran’s embassy in London earlier this month.
The ambassador, Mohsen Baharvand, “is on the change list along with 37 other ambassadors,” the semi-official ILNA news agency quoted foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh as saying on Saturday.
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Khatibzadeh did not say why Baharvand, who has been Iran’s ambassador to the UK for under a year, was being replaced. Baharvand’s predecessor, Hamid Baeidineajd, held the post for almost five years.
Iran’s Kayhan newspaper, whose editor-in-chief was appointed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said that “one of the reasons for Baharvand’s dismissal was the holding of an unconventional ceremony at the Iranian embassy (in London).”
Kayhan was referring to an event held at Iran’s embassy in London earlier this month to mark the anniversary of Iran’s 1979 revolution.
In one video from the event shared on social media, some women could be seen without headscarves, which prompted criticism from some Iranian pro-regime users.
By not covering their hair, Kayhan said, the event’s female guests “violated the basic protocols for attending Iranian diplomatic venues.”
Wearing a headscarf and covering all parts of the body was made mandatory for women in Iran soon after the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979.
Women who leave part of their hair uncovered in public are regularly targeted by Iran’s morality police, known as Gasht-e Ershad.
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