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Iran Summons Turkish Ambassador over Erdogan Remarks

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan arrives at a military parade to mark the victory on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, in Baku, Azerbaijan December 10, 2020. Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Presidential Press Office/Handout via REUTERS
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan arrives at a military parade to mark the victory on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, in Baku, Azerbaijan December 10, 2020. Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Presidential Press Office/Handout via REUTERS
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Iran Summons Turkish Ambassador over Erdogan Remarks

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan arrives at a military parade to mark the victory on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, in Baku, Azerbaijan December 10, 2020. Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Presidential Press Office/Handout via REUTERS
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan arrives at a military parade to mark the victory on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, in Baku, Azerbaijan December 10, 2020. Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Presidential Press Office/Handout via REUTERS

Iran on Friday summoned Turkey’s ambassador to Tehran over the Turkish president’s remarks during a visit to Baku, Azerbaijan, which Iran deemed offensive and said support a secession of Azeri ethnic parts of Iran.

Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said Turkish Ambassador Derya Ors was summoned following Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s “meddlesome and unacceptable” remarks in Baku on Thursday. The official IRNA news agency said Iran has asked Turkey's government for an immediate explanation.

During the visit to Baku, Erdogan attended a parade to celebrate a recent cease-fire agreement that allowed Azerbaijan to reclaim control over broad swathes of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding lands in a conflict with Armenia.

Iran, which borders all three countries, had stayed out of the decades-old conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia and when fighting reignited in September, Tehran urged both sides to seek a peaceful solution.

At the Baku parade, Erdogan, who strongly backs Azerbaijan, reportedly read parts of a poem about how a border tore apart ancient Azeri, or Azerbaijani, lands “by force." It refers to the separation of Azerbaijan between Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan following the Treaty of Turkmenchay in 1828.

Iran's three northwestern provinces — West Azerbaijan, East Azerbaijan and Ardabil — have a predominantly ethnic Azeri population.

Mohsen Pakaeen, Iran's former ambassador to Baku, said such remarks could harm relations between Azerbaijan and Iran.

“The relations between Tehran and Baku are in very good shape now, but Erdogan’s remarks could raise a series of historical and controversial issues between the two countries,” The Associated Press quoted Pakaeen as saying.

IRNA reported that Pakaeen said the Turkish president was trying to spread pan-Turkism, a political movement dating back to the 1880s.

Iran's foreign ministry said “the era of claiming lands and warmongering empires has long ended,” a reference to the Ottoman Empire.

Earlier in the day, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif also criticized Erdogan's remarks in a tweet: “Didn’t he realize that he was undermining the sovereignty of the Republic of Azerbaijan? NO ONE can talk about OUR beloved Azerbaijan.”.

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US Agency Focused on Foreign Disinformation Shuts Down

The State Department's Global Engagement Center has faced scrutiny and criticism from Republican lawmakers and Elon Musk. Mandel NGAN / AFP
The State Department's Global Engagement Center has faced scrutiny and criticism from Republican lawmakers and Elon Musk. Mandel NGAN / AFP
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US Agency Focused on Foreign Disinformation Shuts Down

The State Department's Global Engagement Center has faced scrutiny and criticism from Republican lawmakers and Elon Musk. Mandel NGAN / AFP
The State Department's Global Engagement Center has faced scrutiny and criticism from Republican lawmakers and Elon Musk. Mandel NGAN / AFP

A leading US government agency that tracks foreign disinformation has terminated its operations, the State Department said Tuesday, after Congress failed to extend its funding following years of Republican criticism.
The Global Engagement Center, a State Department unit established in 2016, shuttered on Monday at a time when officials and experts tracking propaganda have been warning of the risk of disinformation campaigns from US adversaries such as Russia and China, AFP reported.
"The State Department has consulted with Congress regarding next steps," it said in a statement when asked what would happen to the GEC's staff and its ongoing projects following the shutdown.
The GEC had an annual budget of $61 million and a staff of around 120. Its closing leaves the State Department without a dedicated office for tracking and countering disinformation from US rivals for the first time in eight years.
A measure to extend funding for the center was stripped out of the final version of the bipartisan federal spending bill that passed through the US Congress last week.
The GEC has long faced scrutiny from Republican lawmakers, who accused it of censoring and surveilling Americans.
It also came under fire from Elon Musk, who accused the GEC in 2023 of being the "worst offender in US government censorship [and] media manipulation" and called the agency a "threat to our democracy."
The GEC's leaders have pushed back on those views, calling their work crucial to combating foreign propaganda campaigns.
Musk had loudly objected to the original budget bill that would have kept GEC funding, though without singling out the center. The billionaire is an advisor to President-elect Donald Trump and has been tapped to run the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), tasked with reducing government spending.
In June, James Rubin, special envoy and coordinator for the GEC, announced the launch of a multinational group based in Warsaw to counter Russian disinformation on the war in neighboring Ukraine.
The State Department said the initiative, known as the Ukraine Communications Group, would bring together partner governments to coordinate messaging, promote accurate reporting of the war and expose Kremlin information manipulation.
In a report last year, the GEC warned that China was spending billions of dollars globally to spread disinformation and threatening to cause a "sharp contraction" in freedom of speech around the world.