How Iran News is Made: Adultery, Earthquakes, and the BBC

I leave it to readers to interpret the significance in this tale of modern journalism:

SATURDAY, 17 APRIL, 1235 GMT: EA's global news team is hard at work. A Twitter lead takes us to the activist site Green Voice of Freedom and produces this update:

Tehran Friday Prayer in 3 Words. Apologies that, lost in the southeast US, I was unable to give you an immediate summary of Hojatoleslam Kazem Seddiqi’s Friday Prayer. Here it is….

Adultery Causes Earthquakes

Or, to be precise, Seddiqi said that reducing sins were necessary for preventing the occurrence of natural disasters. And it seems that many Iranian women who do not abide by the Islamic dress code lead youth astray: “They cause the spread of adultery in society which leads to the increase in earthquakes.”

MONDAY, 19 APRIL, 1936 GMT: In more than 10 months of reporting on the post-election crisis in Iran, we have used Britain's Daily Mail exactly once: "Today’s Iran Non-Story: Some Guy Who Looked Like Ahmadinejad Protested in 1984".

Now, however, the "Mail Foreign Service" makes a dramatic discovery:

Women who wear revealing clothing and behave promiscuously are to blame for earthquakes, a senior Iranian cleric has said.

Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi's comments follow a warning by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that a quake is certain to hit the capital Tehran and that many residents should relocate.

In a prayer sermon, the cleric said: "Many women who do not dress modestly... lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which increases earthquakes."

TUESDAY, 20 APRIL, 1106 GMT: The BBC's top investigative reporters uncover surprising news:

Women who wear revealing clothing and behave promiscuously are to blame for earthquakes, an Iranian cleric says.

Hojjat ol-eslam Kazem Sediqi, the acting Friday prayer leader in Tehran, said women should stick to strict codes of modesty to protect themselves.

"Many women who do not dress modestly lead young men astray and spread adultery in society which increases earthquakes," he explained.