Gholhak Garden

The Qajar monarchy gave the land for Gholhak Garden to the British in the 19th century at the height of their imperial power for their ambassador to use as a summer residence. At the time, Gholhak was a small village outside of Tehran. Built in 1962, the Tehran War Cemetery is also located on the site, and is where over 500 British and Commonwealth soldiers who perished in the First and Second World wars are buried. The Gholhak grounds also contain the Tehran British Council and a school. ==Facilities==

The École Française de Téhéran, the French school, is on the property of Gholhak Garden. ==Disputes and incidents==

Ownership The Islamic Republic of Iran, which has had strained relations with the United Kingdom, has on occasion demanded the return of the Gholhak property to Iran. In 2006, 162 Iranian MPs demanded an inquiry into the garden's status. In October 2011, Tehran's mayor Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf seized on the issue, instructing municipal lawyers to begin legal action to force Britain to forfeit its legal title to Gholhak. Observers suspected that the mayor may have been using the Gholhak dispute to boost his conservative credentials and profile prior to the 2013 Iranian presidential elections. On November 29, 2011, Iranian protesters stormed the British embassy in downtown Tehran and Gholhak Garden. The incident came amid rising tensions over Iran's nuclear program. Earlier in the month, Britain enacted new sanctions against Iran while the Iranian government retaliated by passing legislation to expel the British ambassador. The protesters broke into Gholhak and briefly seized six British embassy staff before being released by the Iranian police. Britain expressed outrage at the riots and warned of "serious consequences." Environmental In late October 2011, Iranian authorities accused the British of "environmental vandalism" for cutting down and burning over 300 trees in the Gholhak complex. Britain responded that it had only removed a "small number" of trees that died of "natural causes and become dangerously unstable", as the extension of the nearby Tehran Metro had disrupted the water supply. In November 2011, the Tehran municipality announced that it had fined the British embassy US$1.23 million for the offence. ==See also==