Humza Yousaf has hit back at David Cameron after the Foreign Secretary threatened to close down Scotland’s overseas offices following a meeting between the First Minister and the President of Turkey.

The SNP leader said the Tory peer was being “really petty and frankly misguided.”

He added that nothing had been discussed at the meeting with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at Cop28 "that hadn’t been discussed at other meetings."

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Mr Yousaf met the Turkish leader at the climate summit in Dubai earlier this month saying the pair had discussed the climate crisis and the “humanitarian crisis in Gaza”.

However, the First Minister did so without an official from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) being present.

It emerged on Monday afternoon, that the First Minister also met with four other world leaders at COP28, all without UK Government advisers.

Details of the diplomatic spat were revealed by the BBC on Sunday.

They obtained a letter from Lord Cameron to Scottish Constitution Secretary, Angus Robertson, complaining about the matter.

He said the Scottish Government had assured the FCDO that it would give "sufficient advance notice" of the meeting to allow one of his officials to attend.

The Foreign Secretary said this "was not done".

He went on: "The absence of an FCDO official at this meeting contravenes the protocols in our guidance on FCDO support to devolved government ministers' overseas visits.

"Any further breaches of the protocol [that] ministerial meetings have a FCDO official present will result in no further FCDO facilitation of meetings or logistical support.

"We will also need to consider the presence of Scottish government offices in UK government posts."

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Speaking to the PA on Monday morning Mr Yousaf said: “First of all, let’s be clear – the approach from Lord Cameron is really petty and frankly misguided.

“Scotland is the part of the UK, outside of London, that has attracted the most foreign direct investment for eight years in a row, that happens because the Scottish Government’s international engagement is valued (and) has impact.

“To threaten to curtail that, to stop that international engagement – the international engagement from the elected Scottish Government from an unelected lord – I think is misguided and petty.”

The First Minister said the meeting in question had been rearranged at short notice by the Turkish president’s team but that he would have had “no problem” with a UK Government official – or even Lord Cameron himself – attending.

“It was rearranged at short notice by the president of Turkey’s team, the FCDO official chose not to stay with the Scottish delegation the whole day, and because of that they ended up missing the meeting.

“Nothing was discussed that hadn’t been discussed at other meetings, such as the climate crisis, and in this particular meeting the issue of the Israel-Gaza conflict.”

The First Minister added that an FCDO official was at the “vast majority” of meetings he had during the climate summit.

Mr Yousaf said revoking support for the Scottish Government abroad would “affect Scottish business, affect the Scottish economy.”

He added: “Our exports are worth over £6bn in whisky alone over the last year showing how important exports, how important international engagement, is to Scotland’s economy.

“For Lord Cameron to say he’s basically going to stop Scotland’s international engagement because of one meeting, where one FCDO official wasn’t able to attend – because, of course, at events like Cop, diaries can change quite last minute – is really petty, really misguided.

“I suggest to Lord Cameron that next time, if he has an issue like that, he should just pick up the phone, I’m sure it can be resolved.”

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Mr Yousaf's meeting with President Erdoğan was criticised by Alister Jack on Monday afternoon, as the Scottish Secretary appeared before Westminster's Scottish Affairs Committee.

He told MPs: "All ministers of the United Kingdom, irrespective if they're ministers in a devolved administration or the UK Government, when they're overseas, when they meet ministers from foreign countries they must have - and this is the protocol for all of us - they must have an official, a civil servant from the Foreign Office present to take notes so there can be no confusions.

"The Scottish Government don't accept that."

He told the Committee there "were five different occasions where meetings happened with foreign ministers without an official."

They included Ursula von der Leyen,the President of the European Commission, Charles Michel, the President of the the European Council, Najib Mikati, the Prime Minister of Lebanon,  and Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar the caretaker Prime Minister of Pakistan.

He went on: "It's not complicated. If there aren't to be any sanctions, all the Scottish Government have to do is take Foreign Office officials to their meetings. That's all we're asking, which is incumbent on me and every other minister in the United Kingdom and everyone else seems to be able to do it."

When asked if the UK Government is "seriously going to follow through on this threat," Jack replied: "I support it 100%."

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Mr Yousaf has already been criticised from within his own party over the meeting.

The Kurdish-born Glasgow SNP councillor Roza Salih said she was "disgusted" as Turkey had stepped up attacks on Kurdish groups in Syria.

Addressing Mr Yousaf on Twitter/X, she wrote: “Our politicians & half of the population are imprisoned by him and you shake his hand. I did not expect this from a FM that says he respects human rights.”

In response to Cllr Salih's criticism, Mr Yousaf said he would not stop meeting world leaders.