An adviser to Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has strongly criticized the recent meeting between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and the ringleader of an anti-Iran terrorist group.
Speaking on Sunday, Hossein Sheikholeslam added that the meeting between Abbas and Maryam Rajavi, the ringleader of the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization, came as no surprise to Iran, Press TV reported.
Abbas met Rajavi in the French capital Paris late Saturday. According to reports, Rajavi briefed Abbas on MKO's recent annual meeting.
"That a Palestinian faction that compromises with the Zionists [Israelis] and that has yielded to Israel under US pressure ... today meets with terrorist elements is no surprise," Sheikholeslam said, referring to the Palestinian Fatah party, which is headed by Abbas.
The Iranian official said the Islamic Republic was already in possession of evidence of Abbas' secret collaborations with the United States.
He said Abbas's relations with terrorist groups and Israelis have been covert and only recently came into the spotlight.
Sheikholeslam referred to MKO's bleak history of assassinations and bombings against Iranian civilians and officials following the 1979 Islamic Revolution and said the terrorist outfit receives support from the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia.
He pointed to MKO's move to side with former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in the eight-year Iraqi war against Iran in the 1980s and said the group maintains its enmity toward Iran with the continuing support of western states.
In early July, the MKO held a meeting in Paris, where Saudi Arabia's former spymaster, Turki al-Faisal, gave a 30-minute speech to the gathering and expressed support for the anti-Iran group.
The Foreign Ministry subsequently summoned the French Ambassador in Tehran Francois Senemaud to hand him a strong note of protest over the meeting.
Iran and Saudi Arabia have no diplomatic relations.
