On Monday, during the joint press conference of Javad Zarif, the foreign minister of Iran, and his German counterpart Heiko Maas, the reporter for the German newspaper Bild asked the foreign minister of the Islamic Republic: “Are homosexuals executed for their sexual preference in Iran?”

To which Zarif responded: “Our society has moral principles based on which the majority of our people live their lives. The moral principles and laws rule over people’s behavior in public spaces, and it is necessary to obey the law and public morality.”

This question and answer were compeltely deleted from the transcripts and reports made by the Iranian media inside the country. The video was later published in Germany and was translated into English and German.

According to Islamic criminal law, execution is one of the punishments for homosexual relationships. Before Zarif, former presidents Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mohammad Khatami had talked in support of this law in Iran.

Ahmadinejad had even denied “the existence of homosexuals in Iran”.