The semi-official Fars News Agency on Sunday quoted an unnamed “senior official” accusing the Deviationists of controlling the trade in contraband cigarettes in the country.
“Some 45% of the cigarettes sold in the market are contrabands that are smuggled into the country illegally from Iraq and Pakistan… The Deviationist Group has formed companies in (those) countries to facilitate the illegal entry of the contrabands into Iran” [Fars News Agency, 6 June].
The Fars story, titled, ‘The Footprints of the Deviationists in Smuggling Zionist Contraband Cigarettes into the Country,’ is probably the first step by the conservatives to bring criminal charges against their political opponents, the group close to President Ahmadinejad and led by Mashaie. The reference to “Zionist Cigarettes” was also the first for the country’s semi-official news agency and the voice of conservatives in classifying tobacco based on the ideology of the cigarettes.
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