Iran urges UN, other world bodies to act on abducted diplomats

Iran said the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and other human rights bodies must fulfill their duties and put pressure on Israel to release the four Iranian diplomats kidnapped in Lebanon more than 30 years ago.

News ID: ۷۶۷۹۴۹

10 July 2016

According to ILNA, Iran’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Sunday on the 34th anniversary of the abduction of four Iranian diplomats - Ahmad Motevasselian, Seyyed Mohsen Mousavi, Taqi Rastegar Moqaddam and Kazem Akhavan - who were kidnapped by a group of Israel-backed gunmen at an inspection post in northern Lebanon on July 4, 1982.

The ministry hailed efforts made by the Lebanese government and some international entities over the past several years to pursue the fate of the missing diplomats.

Regarding the existing evidence of the abduction of these individuals by the mercenaries of the Israel regime and their transfer to the occupied lands, Iran’s Foreign Ministry called on UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the ICRC and other human rights entities to perform their legal duty and prepare the ground for the release of the Iranian diplomats by exerting pressure on Tel Aviv.

The statement hoped that all inmates in Israeli prisons, particularly the four kidnapped Iranian diplomats, would be freed soon and the criminal Zionist perpetrators of the abduction would be brought to justice.

The statement once again stressed the importance of setting up an international fact-finding committee to launch an inquiry into the case.

Iran had previously sent an official letter to the UN secretary general, calling for the establishment of a fact-finding committee to pursue the fate of the abducted diplomats.

Israel claims that the four diplomats were abducted by a Lebanese militant group and were killed shortly after their abduction.