Iran’s Foreign Ministry Urged to Summon French Envoy over MKO Meeting in Paris

According to a report by Fars, as translated by IFP, Hossein Hanizadeh, an expert in foreign policy affairs, pointed to the 17,000 Iranians, many of them civilians, who have been killed by the MKO, and slammed the policies held by France, which has played host to the terrorist group’s members.

He further underlined the need for the Iranian Foreign Ministry to take appropriate stances against the group, saying, “The Foreign Ministry should have taken firm stances and prosecuted the MKO leaders a long time ago, but they are now freely pursuing their activities in European countries, France in particular.”

France is one of the countries that hatches plots against the Iranian nation, Hanizadeh said, urging the Foreign Ministry to summon the French Ambassador François Sénémaud.

 

New French Ambassador to Tehran: An Experienced Diplomat or a Senior Intelligence Agent?

In the past couple of months, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani has received the credentials of new ambassadors coming from such countries as Slovakia, Indonesia, Azerbaijan Republic, and France. Among these new envoys, the French Ambassador François Sénémaud had the most interesting background.

It is interesting to know that, before being appointed as France’s new envoy to Tehran, Sénémaud served as the Director of Information at the French secret service, the Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE), from 2012 to 2016.

The DGSE is France’s external intelligence agency, and the French equivalent to the United Kingdom’s MI6 and the United States’ CIA.

It operates under the direction of the French Ministry of Defence and works alongside its domestic counterpart, the DGSI (General Directorate for Internal Security), in providing intelligence and safeguarding national security, notably by performing paramilitary and counterintelligence operations abroad.

The DGSE is considered one of the world’s most respected intelligence agencies, especially in regards to economic intelligence.

Sénémaud’s previous jobs in the French government, particularly the one at the DGSE, raise questions over the real mission of the new ambassador to Tehran: Is he an experienced diplomat or a senior intelligence agent?