Iran on Monday "
categorically " denied any link with the assailant who stabbed British writer Salman Rushdie, author of the controversial novel "
Satanic Verses
" at a conference in the northern United States on Friday
.
"
We categorically deny
" any link between the aggressor and Iran and "
no one has the right to accuse the Islamic Republic of Iran
", said Nasser Kanani, spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the first Tehran's official reaction to the attack.
Read alsoSalman Rushdie: more than 30 years under the threat of a fatwa
Salman Rushdie, who is now a little better according to his relatives, was stabbed ten times on Friday by a man of Lebanese origin, Hadi Matar, 24.
He is being prosecuted for “
attempted murder and assault
”.
The attack, which caused outrage in the West, was welcomed by extremists in Iran and Pakistan.
The writer has been threatened with death since a “fatwa” issued by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989, a year after the publication of “Satanic Verses”.
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