TEHRAN –Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf has condemned insulting cartoons by a French satirical magazine.

On Sunday, Qalibaf chaired an open session of the Iranian Parliament in which he said the French magazine Charlie Hebdo’s move to insult the Leader of the Islamic Revolution indicates that the West is filled with resentment at failing to carry out the project to foment riots in Iran.

Qalibaf condemned the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo’s move to launch a competition to produce caricatures of the Iranian religious authority.

He said the insulting act reveals the “lack of logic” and “the Western front’ anger at the failure of the project of riots” in Iran.

The French magazine has published outrageous cartoons on Iran. The obscene cartoons were widely considered sacrilege as they depicted Iranian religious and political officials in a very improper way.

The enemies of the Islamic Revolution employed all of their political, economic, international, media and security capacities and tried to unfairly target the pillar of Iran, namely the prudent and popular Leader of the Islamic Revolution, but the people of Iran stymied their plots, Qalibaf added.

He underlined that the worthless insults that reflect the enemy’s frustration will only strengthen the Iranian people’s resolve to move towards independence and development.

The senior lawmaker called on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to take serious retaliatory action against the French government to make the world realize that nobody is allowed to offend Iran’s national values and symbols.

=========Qalibaf due in Turkey this week

Qalibaf will pay a visit to Turkey this week for an Asian parliamentary gathering. 

Qalibaf will be accompanied by a parliamentary delegation during his participation in the 13th Plenary Session of the Asian Parliamentary Assembly (APA) which will be held in the resort city of Antalya. The Plenary Session of APA will take place at Titanic Mardan Palace Hotel in Antalya, Turkey, from January 7 to 11, according to a Tasnim report. 

The meeting will be attended by the parliament speakers from seven countries, namely Turkey, Iran, the Republic of Azerbaijan, Saudi Arabia, Timor-Leste, Turkmenistan and Yemen, as well as four deputy speakers, 25 participating members and five participating observers.

The APA was established in 2006 at the Seventh Session of the Association of Asian Parliamentary for Peace (AAPP). It has 42 Member Parliaments and 16 observers.

The assembly has been created as a forum to exchange views, ideas and experiences for developing common strategies and promoting peace in Asia and the world, according to its website.

The APA is comprised of the Plenary, the Executive Council, Bureau of the Assembly, the Committees, and the Secretariat.