Iran shuts part of French embassy in protest over Charlie Hebdo caricatures of Ayatollah Khamenei

Charlie Hebdo claims cartoons are to support women’s protests and ‘defend freedom against theocracy’

Iran has shut down the cultural wing of the French embassy in Tehran and summoned the French ambassador to formally protest the publication of offensive caricatures of the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

Iran’s foreign ministry on Wednesday said France has “no right to insult the sanctities of other Muslim countries in the garb of freedom of expression”.

“Iran is waiting for the French government’s explanation and compensatory action in condemning the unacceptable behaviour of the French publication,” added foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanani.

And the Iranian government went a step further on Thursday by saying it had reviewed cultural relations with France and decided to shut the French Institute for Research, the French embassy’s cultural wing located in the capital.

“In reviewing cultural relations with France and examining the possibility of continuing French cultural activities in Iran, the ministry is ending the activities of the French Institute for Research in Iran as a first step,” the Iranian foreign ministry said in a statement.

Charlie Hebdo – which has a controversial history of publishing offensive cartoons mocking Islam that led to them becoming the target of three terrorist attacks in recent years – published dozens of caricatures ridiculing Mr Khamenei.

The caricatures of the highest religious and political figure in the country, who has held Iran’s highest office since 1989, were part of a competition launched in December to show support for anti-government protests in Iran.

Iran’s foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian warned that the latest attempt by France to insult its religious and political authority will not go without an “effective and decisive response”.

“We will not allow the French government to go beyond its bounds. They have definitely chosen the wrong path.”

Charlie Hebdo’s latest issue featured the winner of the competition in which entrants were asked to draw the most controversial caricature of Iran’s supreme leader.

One of the finalists drew a turbaned cleric drowned in blood reaching for a hangman’s noose. Another showed Mr Khamenei clinging to a giant throne above the raised fists of protesters while others depicted more vulgar and sexually explicit scenes.

Charlie Hebdo’s director, Laurent Sourisseau, known as Riss, defended the caricatures in an editorial.

“It was a way to show our support for Iranian men and women who risk their lives to defend their freedom against the theocracy that has oppressed them since 1979,” he said.

He added that all the caricatures published had “the merit of defying the authority that the supposed supreme leader claims to be, as well as the cohort of his servants and other henchmen”.

Iran has been rocked by nationwide protests since September last year over the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who was allegedly killed after being detained by Iran’s morality police for violating the country’s Islamic dress code.

Angry women and men across the country have relentlessly protested for four months, with many women stripping off the compulsory headscarf and chopping their hair.

Protesters have demanded the overthrow of Iran’s ruling clerics, in one of the biggest challenges to their rule since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that brought them to power.

At least 476 people have been killed in the protests, according to the non-profit Center for Human Rights in Iran.

Mr Khamenei, the longest-serving head of state in the Middle East, was appointed supreme leader for life. Criticism of Mr Khamenei is also prohibited in Iran.

In 2017, Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman called Mr Khamenei “the new Hitler of the Middle East”.

“We learned from Europe that appeasement doesn’t work. We don’t want the new Hitler in Iran to repeat what happened in Europe in the Middle East,” he had said.