Qualla: Iranian Embassy Siege

Iranian Embassy Siege: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit J WILLIAMS, CC BY-SA 2.0. Number 16 Princes Gate is a white stucco terrace house facing Hyde Park, a building that looks like it should be hosting a charity reception. On the morning of 30 April 1980, a young diplomat named Abbas Lavasani was at his desk inside, working as the embassy's chief press officer. By nightfall on 5 May he would be dead, the building would be on fire, and millions of Britons watching the snooker final would have switched over to see masked soldiers abseiling past the curtains.

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Image: J WILLIAMS | CC BY-SA 2.0

Iranian Embassy Siege: The Men with Bags

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User5330, CC0. Six men crossed the threshold at 11:25 that Wednesday morning. They were Khuzestani Arabs, sent from Iraq and armed by Saddam Hussein's intelligence service, calling themselves the Democratic Revolutionary Front for the Liberation of Arabistan. Their leader, who called himself Oa...

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Image: User5330 | CC0

Iranian Embassy Siege: Negotiation, and the Loss of It

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Mandrake71, Public domain. Margaret Thatcher's government decided within hours that no safe passage would be granted. The police negotiators, working from a forward post in the Royal College of General Practitioners next door, traded broadcast statements for hostages. A pregnant Iranian press officer named...

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Image: Mandrake71 | Public domain

Iranian Embassy Siege: Abbas Lavasani

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sdrawkcab, CC BY-SA 3.0. Lavasani was twenty-nine. He was a believer - a supporter of the revolution that had brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power the year before - and the diplomatic post had been his life's ambition. During the siege he had argued with his captors, told them they were enemies of Iran, s...

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Image: Sdrawkcab | CC BY-SA 3.0

Iranian Embassy Siege: Seventeen Minutes

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User5330, CC0. At 7:23 pm two SAS teams began the assault. One team abseiled down the back of the building; another rappelled to the front balcony while a third lowered a stun grenade through a skylight. One trooper became tangled in his rope, and the explosives planned for the second-floor win...

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Iranian Embassy Siege: After the Cameras

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paasikivi, CC BY-SA 4.0. Trevor Lock was awarded the George Medal and spent the rest of his life as a quiet man who rarely spoke about what he had done; he died in 2025, still uncomfortable with the word hero. Fowzi Nejad served twenty-seven years in British prison, became eligible for parole in 2005, an...

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Image: Paasikivi | CC BY-SA 4.0

Iranian Embassy Siege: Princes Gate Today

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Krokodyl, CC BY-SA 3.0. Number 16 was repaired and reopened. It still serves as the Iranian Embassy. The white terrace looks much like it did before the siege, except for a small detail or two - the architectural details visible to anyone walking from the Royal Albert Hall toward Hyde Park Corner. The R...

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Image: Krokodyl | CC BY-SA 3.0