TEHRAN -- Thousands of
Iranian people across the country took to the streets on Friday to condemn a French magazine’s insult to Muslim sanctities and Iran’s religious and national values.
People attended the rallies after Friday prayers in major cities, including the capital Tehran.
They voiced support for Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei and chanted slogans against Western states and their hostile acts toward Iran and Islam.
The condemnation comes after Charlie Hebdo released several insulting cartoons of Ayatollah Khamenei in a special issue. The infamous right-wing magazine had in early December announced a competition for the cartoons.
Demonstrators issued a resolution, noting that the “insolent move” proves the enemies’ “grudge against Islam.”
The “desperate” measure of the French publication comes in continuation of the four-month-long Western support for riots in Iran, read the announcement.
This, it continued, shows nothing but the destruction of morality and spirituality, and the enemies’ “anger at the grandeur and shining school of Islam” as well as the resistance of the “faithful” Iranian nation.
The resolution called on Iran’s judiciary branch to use “all legal capacities” to put perpetrators of insult to divine prophets and Shia religious authority on trial and cooperate with other Muslim countries to prevent similar “heinous” actions.
It also urged the foreign ministry to make use of all available legal channels to compel the perpetrators and supporters of the insult to express apologies.
Nationwide protests come as a number of peaceful demonstrations have also been held in the past few days in front of the French embassy in Tehran.
Iran’s foreign ministry summoned French Ambassador Nicolas Roche on January 4, handing over to him an official note of protest.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran brooks by no means any insults to its sanctities, and Islamic, religious, and national values,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kan’ani said back then.
“France has no right to justify insults to other countries’ and Muslim nations’ sanctities under the pretext of freedom of expression,” he added.
The French magazine has a long history of publishing derogatory and sacrilegious cartoons in the name of freedom of expression.
Back in September 2020, it republished blasphemous cartoons of Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon Him) that were first released in 2015, sparking anger and outrage across the Muslim world.
The measure led to a deadly attack on January 7, 2015, which claimed the lives of 12 people, including eight staff of Charlie Hebdo.
The magazine has also adopted an aggressive anti-Iranian stance since the outbreak of foreign-backed riots in September, releasing some cartoons deemed offensive and insulting by Iranian authorities.
Iran’s foreign ministry slapped sanctions against dozens of European individuals and entities, including Charlie Hebdo, on December 12 over their meddlesome measures pertaining to Iran’s internal developments and support for acts of terror in the country.
On Friday, Hezbollah condemned the blasphemous cartoons, calling their publication an “ominous” development.
In a statement, the Lebanese resistance movement hit out at Charlie Hebdo for attempting “to weaken the highest religious and Islamic authority in the world”, urging France “to punish” the perpetrators of “the shameless insult to sanctities.”