A picture - published by the Russian embassy in Tehran on its Twitter account - sparked an official condemnation by Iranian officials who considered it harming their country by assuming that other countries can control their national decision, and the Russian ambassador was summoned, at a time when the Iranian parliament speaker waved a response. Strict diplomat.

Yesterday, Wednesday, the Russian embassy in Tehran published a picture of Ambassador Levan Gagaryan with his new British counterpart in Tehran Simon Shercliffe, on the stairs of the embassy building, but the picture, in which a vacant seat appears in the middle of the two ambassadors, sparked controversy in Iran.

The picture brought to mind a similar picture taken in 1943 of the last century, which brought together Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, American Theodore Roosevelt, and British Winston Churchill, in the same place and in the same order, after the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran before the end of World War II.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif described the photo as inappropriate, and said in a tweet that August 2021 is not the same as August 1943.

Zarif said that the Iranians proved - including during the Geneva negotiations to revive the international agreement on the Iranian nuclear program - that foreign embassies or foreign powers will not decide their fate, as he put it.

For his part, the candidate for foreign affairs, Hussein Amir Abdollahian, in the government of the new president, Ibrahim Raisi, commented on the photo published by the Russian embassy, ​​and wrote in a tweet on Twitter that what the Russian and British ambassadors had done was undiplomatic behavior that disturbed Iranian public opinion.

Abdullahian said that this shows the ambassadors' lack of commitment to diplomatic behavior and their lack of respect for the feelings of the Iranian people, calling for correcting what he considered a mistake and for immediate compensation.

For his part, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf described the taking of the photo as inappropriate, and demanded in a tweet that the two ambassadors present an official apology, or that Tehran give a tough diplomatic response, as he put it.

I saw an extremely inappropriate picture today.

Need I remind all that Aug.

2021 is neither Aug.

1941 nor Dec.

1943.

The Iranian people have shown—including during the JCPOA talks—that their destiny can NEVER be subject to decisions in foreign embassies or by foreign powers.

pic.twitter.com/0syILRec5q

— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) August 11, 2021

Summon the Russian ambassador

And the Russian embassy announced that Gagaryan had been summoned to the Iranian Foreign Ministry, over the photo.

She described the reactions to the picture as ambiguous, stressing that she did not intend any hostility behind it.

And she said in a tweet on Twitter that taking into account the ambiguous reaction to the photo, she confirms that it does not contain any anti-Iranian context, and that the embassy will not offend the feelings of the "friendly" Iranian people.

She added that the only meaning of the picture is to pay tribute to the joint efforts of the allied countries against Nazism during World War II, noting that Iran is a neighboring and friendly country.