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Iran summons Polish diplomat to protest US summit
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Iran's head of delegation Majid Shafiepour Motlagh (L), China's top climate negotiator Xie Zhenhua (C) and COP24 president Michal Kurtyka (R) shake hands together at the end of the final session of the COP24 summit on climate change in Katowice, southern Poland, on December 15, 2018.
(AFP/Janek Skarzynski)
I
ran's foreign ministry summoned Poland's top diplomat in the country to protest its decision to host what it called an "anti-Iranian" summit, a spokesman said Sunday.
Poland's charge d'affaires was summoned to "protest the anti-Iranian so-called peace and security conference," ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi said on his Telegram channel.
He was told "this is a hostile act by the United States against Iran and Poland is expected to refrain from going along with the US in holding this conference," Ghasemi added.
The summit was announced Friday by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who said dozens of countries would participate.
They will "focus on Middle East stability and peace and freedom and security here in this region, and that includes an important element of making sure that Iran is not a destabilising influence," he told Fox News.
Poland's representative in Iran, Wojciech Unolt, reportedly said the conference, to be held February 13-14 in Warsaw, was not anti-Iranian and that Poland did not share recent remarks by the US against Iran.
The Iranian official said this was inadequate and Iran would be "forced to retaliate" if Poland did not back down.
Poland's foreign ministry said in a statement late Sunday "the international community has the right to discuss various regional and global issues".
And Poland had the right "to co-organise a conference, whose goal is to develop a platform for actions promoting stability and prosperity in the Middle East region," it added.
Iran's cinema organisation said it had cancelled a Polish film festival scheduled for next month, according to local media.
"A guest who does not honour their host cannot continue to be a guest. To honour Iran's dignity, the Polish film week in Tehran will be postponed until Warsaw's behaviour is proper," tweeted cinema organisation chief Hossein Entezami, according to the semi-official news agency ILNA.
Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif earlier poured scorn on the Warsaw summit and pointed out that the country, then impoverished after invasion by Britain and the Soviet Union, welcomed more than 100,000 Polish refugees during World War II.
"Polish Govt can't wash the shame: while Iran saved Poles in WWII, it now hosts a desperate anti-Iran circus," Zarif tweeted.
