Iranian police failed to act amid embassy attack, suggesting premeditation, says Azerbaijan

By Burc Eruygur

ISTANBUL (AA) - In the wake of a recent shooting at its embassy in Iran, Azerbaijan said Monday that the failure by Iranian police to act in the face of the attack suggests that it may have been planned ahead of time.

"The terrorist who carried out an armed attack on the Azerbaijani Embassy in Tehran was not treated as a criminal when he was detained, and the fact that the Iranian police did not intervene in the terrorist act revealed the possibility that the incident was planned beforehand," Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Aykhan Hajizade said in a press briefing.

Noting that the shooter had chosen a Friday to strike as it was a weekly holiday, Hajizade said the chances that the attack was premeditated were strengthened by the fact that "he brought an automatic weapon, a magazine full of bullets, a pistol, Molotov cocktails and other flammable substances to the scene" in a bid to prevent his plans from being foiled.

The official stressed that Azerbaijan demanded that the assailant be punished, but that Iran had so far given no "logical answer."

"All the evidence shows that the incident was carried out in an organized manner. I cannot provide information on what steps will be taken (by Baku) if satisfactory measures are not taken by Iran regarding the attack on our embassy.

"This will be at the discretion of the (Azerbaijani) administration. The activity of the Iranian police after the incident shows that the Iranian side does not intend to take any concrete measures at this time," he added.

Hajizade further noted that recent misconceptions on the sequence of the attack, concerning inconsistent times shown by embassy security cameras, were due to "technical factors."

"The street-facing cameras of the embassy show the clock 24 minutes earlier. This is due to technical factors. There is a time difference between the cameras inside and outside the embassy. This difference is 24 minutes," he explained.

A gunman stormed the Azerbaijani mission in the Iranian capital on Jan. 27, killing the security officer in charge and wounding two others in what Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev denounced as a "terrorist act."

Azerbaijan evacuated its staff and their family members from the mission after the attack and has also advised its citizens against traveling to Iran.