NOVANEWS
The comment comes as on Tuesday, the European Union blacklisted Press TV CEO Mohammad Sarafraz and Newsroom Director Hamid Reza Emadi for airing a 10-second report about Iranian-Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari, who worked for Newsweek magazine in Tehran in 2009 following post-election riots in Iran.
Sarafraz and Emadi are the latest victims in the ongoing international campaign to repress Iranian media. Both have been falsely accused without explanation or being given the chance to defend themselves.
This is not the first time that Iranian channels come under attack by the West. In January, the Spanish government ordered Madrid’s regional government to stop the broadcast of the Iranian Spanish language channel, Hispan TV, as of January 21, after taking Press TV off the air.
Press TV has conducted an interview with professor of California University, Paul Sheldon Foote, in Irvine, California to further discuss the issue. What follows is an approximate transcription of the interview.
Press TV: Mr. Foote, thank you very much for being on the Top Five. Now the question here is the reason that’s been cited for these sanctions on two individuals on Press TV how do you see those reasons?
Foote: Historically we’ve known from George Orwell’s book 1984 that totalitarian governments need to be able to sensor the truth from the people.
The American government did not sensor radio Moscow for example when I was a boy because it’s only available on shortwave radios when people were sitting in Moscow but Press TV, you even had local stations in England for a while.
And you have just come around the world; you know the truth. I’ve lived and worked in Iran for example at the American embassy. I have served in Vietnam. Many of your other guests have traveled around and worked in different places in the world. They can’t be lied to by the Zionists and Neo-conservatives and Neo-corrupt yanks and other totalitarians.
