Iran summons ‘Zionist manager of Facebook’

An Iranian judge wants Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg to appear in court and answer questions about privacy protections.

According to the Iranian ISNA news service, a judge in the southern Iranian province of Fars ordered the Silicon Valley titan to testify in response to complaints that Instagram and WhatsApp, both of which Facebook owns, violated people’s privacy.

{mosads}An official with the paramilitary volunteer force Basij, seeming to speak on behalf of the court, referred to Zuckerberg as “the Zionist manager of Facebook” and ordered him to appear in court “to defend himself and make compensation for damages,” according to a translation from Agence France-Presse.

A Facebook spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Hill, but Zuckerberg is unlikely to heed the request. Iran has long been antagonistic about social media sites like Facebook, which it has officially banned, along with other sites like Twitter and YouTube.

Despite those prohibitions, many Web users in the country have been able to skirt the censors to access the banned services.

Iranian government officials have also taken to cyberspace to spread the country’s message.

President Hassan Rouhani has been an active user of Twitter and has tweeted about everything from negotiations over the country’s nuclear program to support for the kidnapped schoolgirls in Nigeria.