Iran on Monday denied any link with the attacker who stabbed author Salman Rushdie in its first official response to the attack. Iran's foreign ministry spokesman instead said the author of "The Satanic Verses" and his supporters were the only ones to blame for Friday's attack.
Freedom of speech does not justify Rushdie's insults against religion in his writing, Iran's foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani told a news briefing in Tehran.
"We categorically deny" any link with the attack and "no one has the right to accuse the Islamic Republic of Iran," said Kanaani
"In this attack, we do not consider anyone other than Salman Rushdie and his supporters worthy of blame and even condemnation," he added.
"By insulting the sacred matters of Islam and crossing the red lines of more than one and a half billion Muslims and all followers of the divine religions, Salman Rushdie has exposed himself to the anger and rage of the people."
The Indian-born writer has lived with a bounty on his head since the publication of his 1988 novel "The Satanic Verses". In 1989 Iran's then Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini declared the book was blasphemous and issued a fatwa, or edict, calling on Muslims to kill the novelist and anyone involved in the book's publication.
"Salman Rushdie exposed himself to popular outrage by insulting Islamic sanctities and crossing the red lines of 1.5 billion Muslims," Kanaani said.
He said Iran had no other information about Rushdie's assailant except what had appeared in the media.
Rushdie is recovering after being stabbed repeatedly at a public appearance on Friday in New York state.
'Road to recovery has begun'
On Sunday, the acclaimed author’s agent, Andrew Wylie, said Rushdie had come off the ventilator and that his condition was improving.
“The road to recovery has begun," Wylie wrote in an email to Reuters. "It will be long; the injuries are severe, but his condition is headed in the right direction." Wylie told the New York Times that Rushdie had started to speak again on Sunday, suggesting his condition had improved.
In a statement posted on Twitter, Rushdie's family said that although the injuries he sustained were severe, the author's "usual feisty and defiant sense of humour remains intact".
Suspect arraigned in court
Suspect Hadi Matar, 24, was arraigned in court in New York state over the weekend and pleaded not guilty to attempted murder charges.
Matar was wrestled to the ground by staff and other audience members before being taken into police custody.
Prosecutors said in court that Matar traveled by bus to the Chautauqua Institution, an educational retreat about 12 miles from Lake Erie and bought a pass that admitted him to Rushdie's lecture. Attendees said there were no obvious security checks at the event.
Matar is the son of a man from Yaroun in southern Lebanon, according to Ali Tehfe, the town's mayor. Matar's parents emigrated to the US, where he was born and raised, the mayor said, adding he had no information on their political views.
Tehfe told Reuters on Sunday that Matar's father had returned to Lebanon several years ago, and after word of Rushdie's stabbing spread he had locked himself in his Yaroun home and was refusing to speak to anyone.
The Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah holds significant sway in Yaroun, where posters of Khomeini and slain IRGC commander Qassem Soleimani, who was killed by a US drone strike in 2020, adorned walls at the weekend.
'Vicious' attack on free speech
Friday's stabbing triggered international outrage, with US President Joe Biden calling it a "vicious" attack on free speech.
"Salman Rushdie – with his insight into humanity, with his unmatched sense for story, with his refusal to be intimidated or silenced – stands for essential, universal ideals. Truth. Courage. Resilience," Biden said in a statement.
The 75-year-old novelist had lived under an effective death sentence for many years and in a recent interview with Germany's "Stern" magazine, Rushdie spoke of how, after so many years living with death threats, his life was "getting back to normal".
"For whatever it was, eight or nine years, it was quite serious," he told a Stern correspondent in New York.
"But ever since I've been living in America, since the year 2000, really there hasn't been a problem in all that time."
Rushdie moved to New York in the early 2000s and became a US citizen in 2016. Despite the continued threat to his life, he was increasingly seen in public – often without noticeable security.
Witnesses said Rushdie was seated on stage and preparing to speak when Matar sprang up from the audience and managed to stab him before being wrestled to the ground by staff and spectators.
"The Satanic Verses" and its author remain deeply inflammatory in Iran. When approached by AFP over the weekend, nobody in Tehran's main book market dared to openly condemn the stabbing.
"I was very happy to hear the news," said Mehrab Bigdeli, a man in his 50s studying to become a Muslim cleric.
The message was similar in Iran's conservative media, with one state-owned paper saying the "neck of the devil" had been "cut by a razor".
In Pakistan, a spokesman for the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan, a party that has staged violent protests, said Rushdie "deserved to be killed".
Elsewhere there was shock and outrage.
British leader Boris Johnson said he was "appalled" while Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the attack "reprehensible" and "cowardly".
Messages also flooded in from the literary world, with Rushdie's close friend Ian McEwan calling him an "inspirational defender of persecuted writers and journalists across the world".
(FRANCE 24 with AFP and Reuters)
