TEHRAN -- Iran’s Ministry of Information and Communications Technology on Monday urged directors of Meta and Instagram social media platforms to end censorship of written material as well as photos related to the country’s top anti-terror commander Lt. Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
The call was made in a letter written to directors of Facebook and Instagram by the Iranian ministry’s director general for legal affairs, Reza Fazel, who condemned the measure taken by the two social media platforms and asked for an explanation on their illegal policy toward their users.
The letter was primarily sent to Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive officer of Meta Platforms, which is the parent organization of Facebook and Instagram, while copies of the letter were forwarded to Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, and the current chairwoman of the Federal Communications Commission of the United States Jessica Rosenworcel.
The letter said deletion and censorship of photos and written material related to Gen. Soleimani, who is a well-known hero of the fight against terrorism and eradicator of the Daesh terrorist group, “does not conform to any international norm.”
January 3, 2022 marks the second anniversary of the cowardly assassination of General Qassem Soleimani, who was even admired by the Western media for defeating Daesh and who was martyred by extremist warmongers in the former U.S. president Donald Trump’s administration while on an official diplomatic trip to Iraq, the Iranian ministry said.
Following this terrorist attack, the letter added, while many regional nations were mourning the top commander’s assassination, Instagram began to delete all content related to General Soleimani heedless of international regulations in a widespread online censorship, which was unprecedented in the history of social networks.
Since then, millions of Iranian and non-Iranian Instagram users have been banned from sharing photos, texts and any information related to their beloved hero and they have not been even given any explanation in this regard or any instructions on ways to recover their account, it added.
Instagram executives, the letter said, are expected to respect millions of users who adore this anti-terror hero and end this widespread censorship as soon as possible.