Cultural Affairs Deputy of the Culture Ministry said a ban has been put in place on the import of China-printed copies of the Holy Quran. Bahman Dorri said the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance has issued a communiqué to the country’s custom offices asking them to prevent such copies from getting into Iran. Speaking on the sidelines of a meeting of the ministry’s council of deputies, Dorri added that in cultural issues there should be a cultural, rather than an economic, outlook. He said importing Quran copies from China is unacceptable in terms of Sharia as well as economically, culturally, and scientifically. He added that the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance has plans to renovate and boost the country’s printing industry in order to provide the capacity for printing the Quran and meet the need to Quran copies in Iran and elsewhere. In recent weeks, a number of officials had criticized the import of Quran copies published in China due to the large number of spelling mistakes in the copies./129
