Iran Dismisses European Calls for Restraint

An Iranian woman walks near a billboard of new Hamas leader Yahya Al-Sinwar hanging on a wall at the Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 12 August 2024. EPA/ABEDIN TAHERKENAREH
An Iranian woman walks near a billboard of new Hamas leader Yahya Al-Sinwar hanging on a wall at the Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 12 August 2024. EPA/ABEDIN TAHERKENAREH
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Iran Dismisses European Calls for Restraint

An Iranian woman walks near a billboard of new Hamas leader Yahya Al-Sinwar hanging on a wall at the Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 12 August 2024. EPA/ABEDIN TAHERKENAREH
An Iranian woman walks near a billboard of new Hamas leader Yahya Al-Sinwar hanging on a wall at the Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 12 August 2024. EPA/ABEDIN TAHERKENAREH

Iran's foreign ministry said on Tuesday that calls for restraint regarding Israel from France, Germany and Britain "lack political logic and contradict principles of international law.”

The three European countries issued a statement on Monday calling on Iran and its allies to refrain from attacks against Israel following the killing of Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last month.

The statement was signed by French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Tehran and its allies Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah have accused Israel of carrying out the assassination. The Israeli government has made no claim of responsibility.

"Without any objection to the crimes of the Zionist regime (Israel), the E3 statement impudently requires Iran not to respond to a violation of its sovereignty and territorial integrity," Kanaani said.
Kanaani said Tehran is determined to deter Israel and called on Paris, Berlin and London to "once and for all stand up against the war in Gaza and the warmongering of Israel.”

Starmer held a call with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Monday, asking him to refrain from attacking Israel and saying that war was not in anyone's interest, his office said.

Starmer told Pezeshkian he was deeply concerned by the situation in the Middle East and called on all parties to de-escalate to avoid further regional confrontation.

Scholz also spoke by phone Monday with Pezeshkian and “expressed his great concern about the danger of a regional conflagration in the Middle East.”
The German government said Scholz made clear that “the spiral of violence in the Middle East must now be broken.”
 



Eleven-Year-Old Girl Stabbed in London’s Leicester Square

A photograph taken on August 12, 2024 shows police officers standing by a cordoned off area in Leicester square, London. (AFP)
A photograph taken on August 12, 2024 shows police officers standing by a cordoned off area in Leicester square, London. (AFP)
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Eleven-Year-Old Girl Stabbed in London’s Leicester Square

A photograph taken on August 12, 2024 shows police officers standing by a cordoned off area in Leicester square, London. (AFP)
A photograph taken on August 12, 2024 shows police officers standing by a cordoned off area in Leicester square, London. (AFP)

An 11-year-old girl was seriously injured in a stabbing in London's Leicester Square on Monday, police said in a statement, adding that a man had been arrested at the scene of the attack.

The police said they did not believe the stabbing was terror-related.

The girl's mother, 34, received minor injuries during the incident in the busy central London area which is popular with tourists. The child's injuries were not life threatening, police said.

A 32-year-old man was swiftly arrested and officers were not looking for anyone else in connection with the attack.

"An urgent investigation is now ongoing and detectives are working to establish the details around exactly what happened," the police said. "At this stage we don't believe the suspect and the victims were known to each other."

Britain's police forces remain on high alert after days of riots earlier this month, which were triggered by false online posts wrongly identifying the suspected killer of three girls in northern England as an extremist migrant.