DUBAI - Iran's foreign minister said he believed the detention of a former diplomat linked to the country's reformists was caused by a "misunderstanding" and defended the man's record, Iranian media reported.
Bagher Asadi, who was a senior diplomat at Iran's UN mission in New York before becoming a director at the secretariat of the D8 group of developing nations in Istanbul, was arrested mid-March in the Iranian capital, sources told Reuters this week.
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console.log("catid body is "+catID);if(catID==120){document.getElementsByClassName("divConnatix")[0].style.display ="none";var script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = 'https://player.anyclip.com/anyclip-widget/lre-widget/prod/v1/src/lre.js'; script.setAttribute('pubname','jpostcom'); script.setAttribute('widgetname','0011r00001lcD1i_12258'); document.getElementsByClassName('divAnyClip')[0].appendChild(script);}else if(catID!=69 && catID!=2){ document.getElementsByClassName("divConnatix")[0].style.display ="none"; var script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = 'https://static.vidazoo.com/basev/vwpt.js'; script.setAttribute('data-widget-id','60fd6becf6393400049e6535'); document.getElementsByClassName('divVidazoo')[0].appendChild(script); }It was not clear where Asadi was being held, who arrested the 61-year-old diplomat or on what grounds, the sources said.
Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi confirmed Asadi's arrest, the ISNA news agency reported on Thursday.
