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 TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran on Tuesday lifted its ban on
CNN after the U.S. news network apologized for
misquoting President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
as saying Tehran wanted nuclear weapons, a top culture
ministry official said.
Iran banned CNN journalists from working in the
country on Monday after its simultaneous translation of Ahmadinejad's
news conference on Saturday included the phrase "the use of nuclear
weapons is Iran's right".
In fact, what the Iranian president said was that "Iran has the right to nuclear
energy". CNN later apologized for making a mistake.
"Following a request from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the ban on the activities of CNN's
stringer in Iran was lifted," Mohammad Hossein Khoshvaght, director
of foreign media at Iran's culture ministry, told
Reuters.
Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons, saying it
wants atomic technology for generating electricity.
"I want the channel to be allowed to resume its work owing to the
apology it made," Ahmadinejad said in a
letter sent to the culture ministry, a copy of which was faxed to Reuters.
CNN does not have a permanent bureau in Iran but a local journalist
contributes to the network and visiting correspondents are occasionally
given permission to enter the country on short assignments.
The ban came as CNN's Iranian-born chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour was in Iran to report on the nuclear issue.
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