Iran Closes Newspaper Due To Riot-Provoking Cartoon
Mary K. Brunskill - All Headline News Contributor
Tehran, Iran (AHN) – The government shut down one of Iran’s major newspapers Tuesday and is detaining its editor and cartoonist for publishing a caricature that provoked a protest riot. On Friday, the Farsi-language newspaper Iran published a cartoon in which a cockroach was speaking in Azeri, a language spoken by an ethnic group in northwestern Iran that makes up about a quarter of the country’s 70 million citizens. Enraged by the cartoon, rioters smashed windows in the local governor’s office in Tabriz, the capital of Eastern Azerbaijan province, on Monday. State television reported that the Press Supervisory Body closed the state-owned newspaper "due to its publication of divisive and provocative materials." The editor and cartoonist of Iran are currently in prison. The closure of the paper is indefinite.
Article © All Headline News - All Rights Reserved
|
