The Iranian foreign ministry has rejected accusations of Azerbaijan on the recruitment of Azerbaijanis by the Iranian special services to create a religious state in Azerbaijani territory, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Naser Kanani said on Thursday.
"Unfortunately, the government of the Republic of Azerbaijan is detaining its own citizens on false accusations of links to the Iranian organizations," he was quoted as saying by the Iranian foreign ministry's Telegram channel. - "We reject the allegations of any official or unofficial links between these individuals and the Islamic Republic of Iran. The ties between the citizens of our two states are of historical, religious and even kinship nature, and the government of Azerbaijan must not destroy them."
Kanani also noted that "bringing in offenders is the legitimate right of all governments, but imprisonment of citizens, motivated by their ties with Iran, is unacceptable."
Earlier, the state security service, the interior ministry and the prosecutor's office of Azerbaijan reported on exposing a group of citizens of the republic, allegedly recruited by the intelligence services of Iran and planning to create a religious state on the territory of the country. It is noted that the leaders of the organization compiled a list of officials and public figures, on whom an assassination attempt was to be organized, and handed them over to members of the group, "instructing them to acquire firearms and make "'Molotov cocktails'". According to law enforcement authorities, seven members of the group called "Gisas 313" ("Revenge 313") and others were detained and involved in the investigation during the operation. It was detected that members of the group used funds received from abroad to promote religious radicalism and other subversive activities.
GSV "Russia - Islamic world"
Photo: آرش (Arche)/Creative Commons 3.0
Based on materials from TASS