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Commander says social networks aimed at changing Iranians’ lifestyle

Society Materials 5 July 2015 15:25 (UTC +04:00)

Baku, Azerbaijan, July 5

By Umid Niayesh - Trend:

Mobile social networks applications such as Instagram and Viber are part of a "soft war" against the Islamic Republic to change lifestyle of the Iranians, the country's Ground Force Commander Brigadier General Ahmad Reza Pourdastan said.

Iranian enemies grant free access to social networks for Iranian youth, meanwhile these networks has huge costs, he said, adding they do that because they want to change Iranians' lifestyle and life path.

"Our enemies have employed soft war to attain their goals," Pourdastan said, Iran's Fars news agency reported July 5.

It should be noted that several of world's most popular networks, such as Twitter and Facebook are banned in Iran while users are still able to access them via proxies. A proxy allows bypassing 'gates' meant to block certain sites.

A survey by Iranian Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports indicates that 69.3 percent of the country's young generation use proxy servers to by-pass the filters and access banned Internet websites.

Pourdastan also touched upon the ongoing Iran-West nuclear negotiations, saying the Islamic Republic should not be optimistic towards the US.

"Even if nuclear agreement with the P5+1 is achieved, we should not be optimistic," the commander said.

"Because the US enmity against us is rooted," he added.

Iran and the group P5+1 (the US, UK, France, Russia, China, and Germany) are holding negotiations to hammer out a deal on Tehran's nuclear program.

The sides have only until July 7 to reach a deal.

Follow the author on Twitter: @UmidNiayesh

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