Ali Jannati, Iran's Minister of Culture and Guidance, has announced that a request by the head of Parliament's Culture Commission to ban a number of films has been denied.
Ahmad Salek has reportedly called on Ali Jannati to ban eight films branded as "seditious" by his commission. Iran's conservative factions refer to the opposition protests that were triggered by allegations of vote fraud in 2009 as "sedition."
In a report on Etemad daily on Tuesday October 21, Ali Jannati was quoted as saying: "Films are distributed according to a series of regulations and criteria; we are not supposed to take directions from whomever regarding this responsibility."
He went on to say: "We have the know-how to identify which films are about sedition and we will block them accordingly; all those that follow regulations and criteria will be distributed."
The head of the Culture Commission had called on the Culture Minister to ban eight film including Tales, Garbage and I Am Not Angry!
Iran`s Directors Guild had already urged the Ministry of Culture not to yield to pressure to block the screening of films.
