November 19, 2021
The Judiciary has closed down a newspaper after it published a front-page graphic showing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi’s hand drawing the poverty line in what was seen as linking Khamenehi to the cratering economy.
The Mehr news agency said Iran’s media supervisory body shut down the daily Kelid (Key) after it published a front-page article November 6 titled “Millions of Iranians Living Below the Poverty Line.”
Under the headline, the graphic shows a hand holding a pen and drawing a red line across the page as silhouettes of people underneath reach up to the line.
The graphic included a very distinctive ring that Khamenehi has long worn.
The Young Journalists Club earlier reported that censors were examining the newspaper after publication of the graphic. The state news agency later quoted Alaedin Zohourian, head of the press supervisory board, as saying Kelid had been shut down, without explaining the reason for the decision. Zo-hourian did not say if the closure was permanent or for a limited period of time.
Kelid’s website has also been taken offline. The newspaper was first published in 2013.
The editor-in-chief of the London-based opposition Kayhan newspaper, Elahe Boghrat, tweeted that Kelid had lifted the graphic from its pages, citing a drawing by Ali Eshtyagh for Kayhan in March 2021, but removing the artist’s signature.
Article 27 of Iran’s Press Law says: “Whenever the Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran or the true Sources of Emulation are insulted in a publication, its license will be revoked and its responsible manager and the author of the article will be brought before the appropriate court and punished.”
While radio and television stations are all state-owned in Iran, newspapers and magazines can be owned and published by private individuals. Iran currently has 73 dailies published, most of them with very little circulation, created mainly to be the mouthpiece of the publisher.