Angered by Coverage of Recent Western Fiascos:

Twitter Blocks Accounts of Iranian Media Outlets

Date: 21 July 2019 - 21:48

News ID: ۶۸۳۸۹

WASHINGTON (Dispatches) -- A day after Twitter suspended the accounts of several Iranian state media outlets, the social networking service claimed that it acted after alleged harassment of people linked to the Baha’i cult.
However, some of the affected media outlets speculated that the suspensions were related to their coverage of Iran’s seizure on Friday of a British-flagged tanker in the Strait of Hormuz.
"Account suspended. Twitter suspends accounts which violate the Twitter Rules,” read English-language messages on each of the Iranian media outlets’ accounts.
Mehr news agency said its Farsi-language account appeared to have been blocked late Friday following its reports on the seizure of the tanker Stena Impero in the strategic Strait of Hormuz.
Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) said it seized the tanker for breaking "international maritime rules” in the strait, a chokepoint for around a third of the world’s sea-borne oil.
Mehr’s Farsi-language Twitter page was inaccessible on Saturday, along with those of the official IRNA news agency and the agency of the Young Journalists’ Club.
"Since last night and after seizure of a British tanker in the Strait of Hormuz the account of the Young Journalists’ Club and some other users have been suspended,” the YJC said on its website.
Mehr noted that its Mehr Diplomacy account, which publishes analysis and interviews on foreign policy, was also offline.
Another account taken down belonged to Ali Akbar Raefipoor, a public speaker.
None of the owners of the suspended accounts said they had been given any reason for the move by Twitter.
Iranian media outlets have recently played a central role in proving U.S. and British authorities wrong.
When U.S. President Donald Trump claimed on Thursday that a U.S. warship had shot down an Iranian drone over the Strait of Hormuz, the IRGC released footage of the unmanned aerial vehicle filming the American vessel and safely returning to its base.
On Saturday, the IRGC posted a video online on Saturday showing speedboats pulling up alongside Stena Impero and troops wearing ski masks and carrying machine guns rappelling to its deck from a helicopter.
Intercepted radio communications between a British warship and Iran’s IRGC on Sunday showed that the British navy tried but failed to prevent the seizure of the British tanker in the Strait of Hormuz.