Australia’s decision to expel the Islamic Republic's ambassador to Canberra was an unjustified move to please Israel, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman told Australian broadcaster Channel 9, blaming what he called a Mossad plot.
“It’s regrettable. We think what the Australian government did was unjustified,” Esmail Baghaei said in an interview with 60 Minutes.
The remarks came after Canberra expelled ambassador Ahmad Sadeghi following an ASIO-led investigation linking Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) to two anti-Semitic attacks in Melbourne and Sydney.
Baghaei said “no one can believe in Iran that this accusation has any basis in reality. It is simply a fabrication."
The decision was “the easiest way to please or appease” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he said, alleging that the case was the result of a Mossad-engineered plot.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last month described the incidents — one targeting a Melbourne synagogue and another a kosher restaurant in Sydney — as “extraordinary and dangerous acts of aggression.” Albanese said they were attempts to “undermine social cohesion and sow discord in our community.”
The Australian government has since announced plans to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization.
Baghaei dismissed such designations as the product of a “campaign of disinformation and misinformation,” saying the IRGC is a “strong force against Iran’s enemies.”
He also rejected allegations that Iranian authorities have monitored or harassed members of the diaspora in Australia, despite a 2023 Senate inquiry documenting hundreds of such claims.
“We categorically deny any such report, any such allegation of Iran doing surveillance or monitoring on our citizens in Australia,” Baghaei said.
Asked whether Iran would seek to repair relations, Baghaei said: “It was the Australian government that decided to cut down diplomatic relations. It was not vice versa … we have been self-restrained in terms of our reaction to what they did.”
