Iran summoned Germany’s ambassador on Tuesday to protest recent “anti-Iran activities” following a major demonstration in Munich over the weekend, state media reported.
Saturday’s protest in Munich, attended by an estimated 250,000 people according to police, featured a speech by Reza Pahlavi, the son of the shah ousted in the 1979 Islamic Revolution and a vocal critic of the current Iranian authorities.
“Following anti-Iran activities in Germany and destructive positions taken by officials of this country against the Islamic Republic of Iran in violation of international law, Axel Dittmann, Germany’s ambassador in Tehran, was summoned to the foreign ministry, and Iran’s strong protest was conveyed to him,” the official IRNA reported.
“The German ambassador said he would convey Iran’s strong protest and deep dissatisfaction to Berlin.”
Iran recently experienced a wave of anti-government protests that initially arose over the rising cost of living.
In response to last month’s unrest, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he believed “we are now witnessing the last days and weeks of this regime."
Iranian authorities maintain that the demonstrations began peacefully before turning into “foreign-instigated riots”, which they attribute to the United States and Israel.
Tehran has acknowledged that more than 3,000 people died during the unrest, including security personnel and bystanders, attributing the deaths to “terrorist acts”.
International organisations, however, report much higher figures. The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) estimates that over 7,000 people were killed, the majority of them protesters.
