TEHRAN: The rising cost of raw chicken in Iran has prompted the police chief to urge broadcasters to censor it from television screens in the interests of social harmony.

Against a backdrop of lengthening food queues, Esmail Ahmadi-Moghaddam, the head of Iran's law enforcement forces, has warned that films showing scenes of people eating chicken could provoke attacks on the country's more well-off citizens.

''They show chicken being eaten in movies while somebody might not be able to buy it,'' Mr Ahmadi-Moghaddam, the brother-in-law of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, told a law enforcement conference in Tehran.

''Films are now the windows of society and some people observing this class gap might say that we will take knives and take our rights from the rich. IRIB [Iran's state broadcaster] should not be the shop window for showing all which is not accessible.''
The warning is the latest sign of official alarm over the strains being caused by rampant inflation and international sanctions aimed at curbing Iran's nuclear program.

The country's already creaking economy suffered a further blow this month when a European Union boycott of oil sales took effect at the same time as a US embargo penalising countries that continued to buy Iran's crude oil. Oil revenues, on which the economy heavily depends, have been badly hit as a result.

Rising chicken prices have come to symbolise the privations being endured by Iran's citizens. In recent weeks, shoppers have had to spend 70,000 rials ($5.50) for a kilogram of chicken - around three times last year's price.

Farmers and retailers have blamed a shortfall of imported livestock feed, partly caused by sanctions, leading in turn to a drastic rise in the price of domestically produced feed.

Increases have been seen in the costs of red meat, fruit and vegetables.

With chicken forming a core part of the meat-rich national diet, long queues have been reported at state food distribution centres, where it has been sold in rationed quantities at lower, government-fixed prices.

Perhaps with a view to stemming negative reporting, the Caspian Sea province of Gilan even took the novel step of offering discounted chicken to accredited journalists.

Last week, the Iranian Culture and Islamic Guidance Minister, Mohammad Hosseini, warned the media against reporting the economic impact of sanctions.

Telegraph, London