Iran on Sunday criticised a recent meeting between the French president and opponents of the Islamic republic, calling Emmanuel Macron’s comments after the encounter “regrettable and shameful”.

Axar.az reports citing foreign media that Macron on Friday met with four prominent Iranian dissidents, all of them women, as protests that have rocked Iran for weeks after the death of Mahsa Amini show no signs of abating.

The 22-year-old had been arrested by the morality police for an alleged breach of the country’s strict dress rules for women. The meeting was “a flagrant violation of France’s international responsibilities in the fight against terrorism and violence”, foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said. “We consider that France favours these sinister phenomena,” he added.

US-based activist Masih Alinejad, who for years has led a campaign encouraging Iranian women to remove their obligatory headscarves, and Ladan Boroumand, co-founder of Washington-based rights group Abdorrahman Boroumand Center, were among those at the meeting. Alluding to Alinejad, Kanani said it was “surprising that the president of a country that stands for freedom would degrade himself by meeting” her, charging that she had “tried to spread hate and carry out violent and terrorist acts in Iran and against Iran’s foreign diplomatic missions”.