(MEMRI) Massoud Shojaei Tabatabaei, the secretary of the third International Holocaust Cartoon Contest in Tehran and of the two previous contests, said that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was speaking for himself when he denied any connection between the Iranian government and this event. On April 27, in an interview with the Iranian website Nasimonline, Tabatabaei explained that the organization he heads "cooperates with the Ministry of Culture" and that everyone in the regime "knows that this exhibition is highly respected. Therefore, the foreign minister's statements are not in line with the Ministry of Culture." On April 29, exiled Iranian journalist Aida Qajar wrote on Iranwire, "Zarif was not telling the truth, or at least not the whole truth. The fact is that this competition has the official backing of the Iranian government, and the government has helped with its preparation....The foreign minister [asked]... 'Why does the U.S. have the Ku Klux Klan? Is the government of the U.S. responsible for the fact that there are racially hateful organizations in the U.S.?' But, of course, Zarif ignored the main point:...The U.S. government does not fund the activities of the KKK."
2016-05-06 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive