Ahmadinejad's minister endorses blogs in Iran

Hossein Saffar-Harandi, the most fundamentalist minister of culture and Islamic guidance Iran has ever had, has not only publicly endorsed blogs, but also announced plans for including them, as well as websites, within the purview of a new government office that used to oversee only the press.

Given Iran's strict new policies against cultural products that promote "western" ideas such as feminism, liberalism, nihilism and humanism, the recent endorsement of blogs seems contradictory. The flourishing of blogs, estimated at more than 700,000 worldwide, has created a new space for self-expression on political and social matters.

In a speech during the closing ceremony of the first Festival for Islamic Revolutionary Blogs and Websites, co-sponsored by the ministry of culture, Mr Harandi celebrated the fact that everyone in Iran could now comment on current issues and "speak like a president".

Read the rest of my post on the Guardian's newsblog.