Khamenei's appointee to Tehran's Friday Prayer: Anyone asking for a "democratic" Republic is our enemy
Ahmad Khatami is Iran's ultra-conservative cleric appointed by the leader, Ayataollah Khamenei, to Tehran's Friday Prayer. Ahmad Khatami in today's Friday prayer sermon called anyone looking for a "democratic" Islamic Republic in Iran an enemy of the state, apparently referring to Mousavi, Karrubi, Mohammad Khatami and other reformists of the Green movement.
He also called allegations against the government a Big Punishable Sin. He asserted that "even if there is truth to some allegations, but the truth is part of government secrets, it is a matter of regime's dignity and like its blood, so disclosing that truth is crossing our red lines. Internet and even text messages can also cause perpetration of Big punishable Sins if we just relay to others what we see on the Internet." [approximate translation from Farsi].
In recent weeks, after allegations by Mehdi Karrubi and other reformists of rape in Iran's political prisons, Ahmadinejad's government has shut down Karrubi's Etemad and other reformist publications but Internet seems elusive to the government and many younger people use filter-breakers and proxy technologies to bypass government censorship.//
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