Fars News Agency
Fars News Agency (FNA) is a news agency in Iran. While it describes itself as "Iran's leading independent news agency",[1] news organizations such as CNN[2] and Reuters[3] describe it as a "semi-official" news agency with ties to the government. The Wall Street Journal has stated the agency is affiliated with the Revolutionary Guard Corps.[4]
Its managing director Saeid Noubari is a former head of the public relations office of the Tehran Justice Department. FNA's managing editor Mehdi Fazaeli is also the spokesman of Iran's Association of Muslim Journalists.
In addition to Persian, FNA also provides news in English, Turkish and Arabic.
Rewording of press release
In May 2012, Human Rights Watch sent out a press release regarding the United Nations' scrutiny of Bahrain. In part, it said: "The voice of the international community has been subdued regarding Bahrain’s manifold violations, especially compared with the international response to abuses in Syria, Libya, Iran, and other Middle Eastern countries."[5]
Fars News Agency chose to publish it with this wording: "The voice of the international community has been subdued regarding Bahrain's manifold violations, especially compared with the international response to abuses in Israel, Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries."[6]
Interview with Egyptian president
Recently, Fars News Agency released an interview with Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi in which he wants a strategic alliance with Iran. Both the competing Iranian news agency Irna and the Egyption news agency Mena dispute the authenticity of this interview. [7]
Reposted "news" story by The Onion
In September 2012, Fars News picked up -- as fact -- a story from The Onion, a satirical newspaper, about a supposed survey showing an overwhelming majority of rural white Americans would rather vote for Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than US President Barak Obama in the upcoming US elections.
The Iranian version copied the original word-for-word, even including a made-up quote from a fictional West Virginia resident who says he'd rather go to a baseball game with Ahmadinejad because "he takes national defense seriously, and he'd never let some gay protesters tell him how to run his country like Obama does."[8][9]
See also
References
- ^ "Fars News Agency". English.farsnews.com. 2006-03-21. Retrieved 2011-12-13.
- ^ "Iranian seminarians denounce anti-government protesters". CNN. 2009-12-12. Retrieved 2011-12-13.
- ^ "Iran investigates reports it detained Britons-media". Reuters. 2009-12-01. Retrieved 2011-12-13.
- ^ "Iran Says Amiri Spied on U.S." The Wall Street Journal, Farnaz Fassihi. July 21, 2010
- ^ Bahrain: Human rights body should target repression
- ^ Human Rights Violation in Bahrain; from Using Banned Arms to Torturing Protestors
- ^ Morsy denies Iranian interview on peace 'review'
- ^ Iran's news agency portrays satirical Onion story as its own
- ^ [1]