Iran FM: ‘France lacks moral authority' to lecture Iran
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has condemned recent anti-Iranian remarks by his French counterpart, Jean-Noel Barrot.
Araghchi said on Sunday that French officials “have no moral authority” whatsoever to lecture Iranians on human rights.
The top diplomat criticized France’s own human rights records, saying Paris has made many violations in this area, which undermine its credibility as a human rights advocate.
He added that no example illustrates this hypocrisy more clearly than France’s stance on Israel and its war crimes.
There have been many transgressions making a mockery of France’s “human rights activism”. But perhaps nothing has made the hypocrisy as stark as the French approach to the Israeli regime and its war crimes.
Spare us Iranians the lectures. You have no moral authority whatsoever. pic.twitter.com/1oly4Gcs6L
— Seyed Abbas Araghchi (@araghchi) May 25, 2025
Araghchi’s comments came after the Iranian Foreign Ministry summoned the French envoy in protest at Barrot’s remarks earlier on Sunday.
The French chargé d’affaires to Tehran was summoned after an Iranian filmmaker won a prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and Barrot described the movie as a gesture of resistance against oppression.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry also condemned the French government’s exploitation of the cinematic event to advance its own political objectives against Iran.
It said the French government used the film festival to promote its political agenda against the Islamic Republic.
Iranian Director Jafar Panahi’s film, It Was Just an Accident, was awarded the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival on Saturday.
In an interfering comment, the French foreign minister said in a French post on his X account that the film would reignite “hope for freedom fighters around the world.”
