The reissue of caricatures of Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, by the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo is a "
great unforgivable sin
", ruled Tuesday, September 8 the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei.
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To mark the opening on September 2 of the trial in Paris of the jihadist attacks against Charlie Hebdo, police officers and a Jewish supermarket that killed 17 people in the French capital in January 2015, the satirical weekly has given the caricatures of Mohammed back to the front page.
These had made the weekly a target of the jihadists.
Ridiculing or insulting Muhammad is punishable by death in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
"
The great unforgivable sin of a French publication having insulted the radiant and holy face of the great Prophet once again reveals the hostility and vicious resentment of the political and cultural institutions of the Western world towards Islam and the Muslim community
", Ayatollah Khamenei wrote in a statement.
"
The pretext of freedom of expression invoked by certain French politicians in order not to condemn this great crime must be rejected as erroneous and demagogic
", he added without further details.
"
Insult
" against Muslims
French President Emmanuel Macron had declared about the re-publication of the cartoons of Mohammed by Charlie Hebdo that "
there is (...) in France a freedom to blaspheme which is attached to the freedom of conscience
".
“
I am here to protect all these freedoms.
Most Iranian conservative and ultraconservative newspapers reacted to these comments by making a connection with French law qualifying Holocaust denial as an offense, denouncing a double standard policy.
Iran had condemned in January 2015 the attack against Charlie Hebdo, judging however that these drawings were an "
insult
" towards Muslims.
Before the Supreme Leader, Iranian Foreign Affairs condemned
the new publication of the cartoons
as "
a provocation and an insult
" against Muslims around the world.
For Ali Khamenei, the decision to republish them "
could also be intended to divert the minds of the nations and governments of the Near and Middle East from the sinister plans that the United States and the Zionist regime (Israel, Editor's note) have in mind for this region
”.