During his weekly press conference on Monday, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Saeed Khatibzadeh announced that Sadeq will soon head to Baghdad to commence his duties as the country’s new ambassador to Iraq.
According to the semi-official Tasnim news agency, the new Iranian ambassador was born in the city of Najaf in central Iraq, which is considered one of the spiritual capitals of Shiite Islam and the center of Shiite political power in Iraq. Sadeq had served as Masjedi’s first deputy for a number of years, and speaks Arabic in its Iraqi accent fluently.
Masjedi, who served as Iran’s ambassador to Iraq from 2017, stated in March that his country’s missile attack on Erbil was not a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty, but rather “a reaction to the Zionists and the Mossad spy base."
Under the pretext of targeting an Israeli base, Iran fired a dozen ballistic missiles on a number of targets on the outskirts of the Kurdistan Region’s capital city. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has repeatedly denied any form of Israeli presence.
Masjedi’s statement regarding the missile attack on Erbil contradicted the comments he made to Rudaw in February 2021, when he criticized Turkey for bombing Iraq.
"We reject military intervention in Iraq and Turkish forces should not pose a threat or violate Iraqi soil," Masjedi said last year. "The security of the Iraqi area should be maintained by Iraqi forces and [Kurdistan] Region forces in their area."
