Various Iranian journalists and influences have taken to complaining about Instagram’s censorship of their posts referring to or reporting about the death of general Qassem Soleimani.
Newsweek is reporting that the Association of Iranian Journalists in Tehran, Iran, wrote to the CEO of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, asking for a rollback of the censorship.
Newsweek claims that Iranian officials have blamed the U.S., for the censorship, claiming that they’re attempting to suppress anything positive about Soleimani from being made via social media.
The Minister of Information and Communications Technology, Mohammad Javad Azari-Jahromi even went as far as to say that the censorship was to prevent people from echoing “the U.S. terrorism in the world.”
IFJ General Secretary Anthony Bellanger made a more neutral statement, saying…
“At a time when Iranian citizens need access to information it is unacceptable that Instagram should choose to censor Iranian media and individual journalists and uses,”
This comes during a time when Instagram’s parent company, Facebook, claimed that they wouldn’t be censoring political ads or limiting the potential reach of said ads via audience targeting, as reported by Fox Business.
Interestingly enough, Iranian officials are using other social media services such as Twitter to condemn Instagram for censoring journalists, which is why Iranian government spokesman Ali Rabiel did.
In an undemocratic and unashmed action,Instagram has blocked an innocence nations’ voice protesting to the assesination ofGeneral #Soleimani,while the real terrorists have been given an open voice.The stick behind the democracy and media freedom is displayed in the nick of time
— Alirabiei (@Alirabiei_ir) January 6, 2020
This comes after a strange volley of reports from Leftists in America who came running to the aid of Iran while condemning President Donald Trump. Their treasonous behavior deserved to be called out for more than it was, but at the same time Instagram running interference by censoring Iranian journalists is just another notch in their ever-increasing canvas of censorship.
(Thanks for the news tip fnd)
