Neda Agha-Soltan Graduate Scholarship the country the status of "international basket case". While the problems of Iran were no longer front-page news, it said, they still existed. In the circumstances, the editorial concluded, "A scholarship at The Queen’s College in memory of Neda Soltan is, indeed, politically motivated, and admirably so". UK diplomatic sources, speaking anonymously to "The Times", said that if the government had been asked, it would have advised against the creation of the scholarship, because Iran would see it as an act of provocation, and because it would interfere with efforts to free Iranians working for the British Embassy in Tehran
Iran–United Kingdom relations Iran's accusations are baseless without evidence. After the arrest of UK staff, the European Union (EU) has also demanded that UK staff be released in Iran under international law and if the UK staff are not released then the EU threatens a 'strong response'. On December 29, 2009, Britain was warned by Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki to state "Britain will get slapped in the mouth if it does not stop its nonsense." The Queen's College, Oxford established the Neda Agha-Soltan Graduate Scholarship in 2009, named after Neda Agha-Soltan, who died in the protests that followed the election. This led