Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks during Friday prayers in Tehran September 14, 2007. Photo: REUTERS/Morteza Nikoubazl/File Photo

i24 News – Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Saturday that persons desecrating the Koran should face the “most severe punishment” and demanded Sweden hand them over for prosecution in Islamic countries, Iran’s state media reported.

“All Islamic scholars agree that those who desecrate the Koran deserved the most severe punishment… The duty of that (Swedish) government is to hand over the perpetrator to the judicial systems of Islamic countries,” Khamenei said in a statement carried by state media.

Also Saturday, Iraqi security forces dispersed about 1,000 supporters of Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr who tried to march to Baghdad’s Green Zone housing foreign embassies, believing a Koran had been desecrated in Denmark.

The protesters were reacting to reports of an apparent desecration of the Muslim holy book for the third time in a month, with the first two in Sweden already raising diplomatic tensions.

Iran said late Friday it will not allow a new Swedish ambassador into the country.

The actions of Sweden-based Iraqi refugee Salwan Momika, whose book-burning protest had been permitted by Stockholm on free speech grounds, triggered condemnation across the Muslim world.

Following the Copenhagen incident, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said: “The Danish government is responsible for preventing insults to the holy Koran and Islamic sanctities, as well as prosecuting and punishing those who insult them.”