IntelSat Media Blackout Includes 19 Iranian Channels

19 Iranian Channels taken Off Air By Intelsat on US order
22 October, 2012 – Jafria News

JNN 22 Oct 2012 Brussels : The International Telecommunications Satellite Organization (Intelsat) has taken a number of Iranian channels off the air in Europe based on an order by the United States.

The US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has ordered the international broadcast services provider to shut down the Iranian channels, including Sahar, Jam-e-Jam, Islamic Republic of Iran News Network and al-Kowsar.

Press TV was not included in the list of the channels that have been removed.

However, the EU later told Press TV that Eutelsat had taken the decision on its own. Press TV has learned that Israeli lobbies have stepped up their pressure on international satellite companies to ban Iranian channels.

One of Europe’s leading satellite providers on Monday said it would terminate its contract with Iran’s broadcast company, IRIB, immediately pulling 19 state-owned television and radio channels off the air. saying that the decision was made by the European Union.

Viewers in the Middle East, Iran’s main cornerstone of influence, and Europe as well as those inside Iran who accessed the channels through the popular Hotbird satellite no longer have access to the channels.

Eutelsat Communications SA ETL.FR +0.52% said it stopped broadcasting the Iranian channels in light of European sanctions approved in March and a French regulatory decision. The move comes a little over a week after Iran escalated the jamming of Eutelsat satellites to censor broadcasts during recent protests over a plunge in the local currency.

The announcement came as the European Union on Monday approved new sanctions on Iran targeting financial institutions, trade, energy and shipping to urge Tehran to comply with its international obligations on its nuclear program. That was the latest effort by the bloc to bring Iran back to negotiations after a half-year of deadlocked talks. It was not those Monday sanctions that led to Eutelsat’s decision.

It also emerged Monday that the U.S. and the EU are looking to close loopholes in sanctions designed to impede Iran’s oil exports after they discovered that Tehran is secretly using offshore tax havens to help ship its crude.

Though Eutelsat’s decision to remove Iran’s government-owned channels isn’t related to the nuclear standoff, the move serves to isolate the Islamist Republic further. …more