DUBAI (Reuters) – Twitter said on Friday it had suspended what it said was a fake account that carried a link to the website of Iran’s Supreme Leader on Friday, hours after it carried the image of a golfer resembling former U.S. President Donald Trump apparently being targeted by a drone.
The post, on a Persian-language account carrying a link to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s website, had carried the text of remarks by him in December in which he said “Revenge is certain” – referring to the killing of a top Iranian general in a U.S. drone attack.
A Twitter spokeswoman said the @khamenei_site account was suspended for violating the company’s platform manipulation and spam policy, specifically the creation of fake accounts. Asked if the @khamenei_site account was fake, she said it was.
The golfer image tweet was retweeted by Khamenei’s main Persian-language account @Khamenei-fa, although it appeared to have been deleted later. The text and graphic of the tweet was also carried by Khamenei’s official website (farsi.khamenei.ir) and widely quoted by Iranian media.
Khamenei’s @Khamenei_fa account and his main Twitter account in English, which did not carry the golfer image tweet, were still operational.
(Reporting by Dubai newsroom; writing by Michael Perry and Philippa Fletcher; Editing by Jon Boyle)
