The Azerbaijani embassy in London

Shia Muslims Storm the Embassy of Azerbaijan in London: Video Report

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LONDON — On Thursday, August 4, Shia Muslim groups attacked the Embassy of Azerbaijan in London. The English newspaper the Daily Mail reported that members of a group called Mahdi Servants Union appeared on the balcony of the Azerbaijani Embassy, which is in Kensington, the central area of London. The Shia activists pulled out and threw the Azerbaijani flag from the balcony and waved their blue banner. They also wrote messages on the wall in Arabic with white paint.

The members of the Servants Union cited “persecution” by the Azerbaijani government of some Shia Muslims in the country. The metropolitan police were put on alert immediately. After arriving, they arrested eight people. According to the information that is available, the Mahdi Servants did not enter inside the embassy building, but remained on the balcony.

The leader of the Mahdi Servants Union, Islamic activist and writer Yasser Al-Habib, found refuge in Great Britain “after coming into conflict with the authorities in his native Kuwait,” another British source reported. In 2001, he founded the Mahdi Servants Union. Al-Habib runs a mosque in the suburbs of London.

In 2018, a group led by Al-Habib’s relative Ayatollah Sadegh Shirazi similarly stormed the Embassy of Iran in London. The attack occurred after the government of Iran arrested one of Shirazi’s sons, who lived in Iran.

On Friday, August 5, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan summoned the United Kingdom’s chargé d’affaires in Baku over the attack in London.

A “resolute protest” was expressed to the British diplomat, the statement by the Foreign Ministry said.

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