IRIB doesn't produce any license to broadcast Shajarian's works
TEHRAN,
Sept. 16 (Mehr News Agency) -- Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) has not produced
any document to prove that the organization had a permit to broadcast works by
vocalist Mohammadreza Shajarian, Shajarian's attorney Mohammad-Hossein Aqasi
said on Tuesday.
In late July, an interrogator of the Tehran public prosecutor's office ordered
IRIB to present its license to broadcast works by Shajarian, who protested the
extensive use of his songs used in programs celebrating Mahmoud Ahamadinejad's
victory in the June 12 presidential election.
Shajarian's epic songs that he performed in 1979 and 1980, which still have
the ambiance of the early days of the Islamic Revolution, were also frequently
broadcast by Iranian state TV and radio during programs encouraging people to
vote in the election.
Afterward, he wrote a letter to IRIB managing director, asking IRIB to
immediately stop broadcasting his songs and other works.
Shajarian sued IRIB after the organization continued broadcasting his work.
"In reply to the interrogator's order, IRIB has referred to generalities about
the organization's mission, upon the alleged basis of which IRIB has used the
works of master Shajarian to promote Iranian traditional music," Aqasi said.
"They also claim that since master Shajarian had made no prior objection to the
broadcast of his music by IRIB, the organization inferred that he was in
agreement with their use of it," he added.
Meanwhile, Shajarian said that he had previously expressed his objections to the
broadcasting of his works on IRIB in 1995.
Shajarian has also filed a lawsuit against the conservative Persian daily Kayhan,
which called him a "stooge of colonialism" and a "traitor" for his interviews
with foreign Persian language news agencies, including the Persian service of
BBC, following the presidential election.
The Kayhan article provoked an angry reaction from Iran's House of Music, which
issued a press release on Sunday asking officials to denounce such insulting
"anti-cultural" actions.
Shajarian, 68, is the director of the House of Music High Council, Iran's most
important music body.
TEHRAN,
Sept. 16 (
