Hezbollah denounces CNN for forced resignation

Hezbollah denounced CNN, on Thursday, for forcing out senior Middle East editor Octavia Nasr after she sent a Twitter message praising the late Shiite cleric Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah.

Hezbollah spokesman Ibrahim Moussawi denounced the "intellectual terrorism represented by the firing of journalist Octavia Nasr of CNN after she expressed sadness" at the death of Fadlallah. "This measure reveals the double standard in the West regarding matters in the region and unmasks the United States, which pretends to protect freedom of speech," he added in a statement.

Nasr said in a "tweet" over the weekend that she was "Sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah ... One of Hezbollah's giants I respect a lot." She followed that up with a blog post on CNN.com expressing "deep regret" for her "tweet" about the man, who figured on a US "terrorist" list.

"It was an error of judgment for me to write such a simplistic comment and I'm sorry because it conveyed that I supported Fadlallah's life's work," Nasr wrote. "That's not the case at all."

She said she was referring to Fadlallah's "contrarian and pioneering stand among Shiite clerics on woman's rights." "This does not mean I respected him for what else he did or said," she said. "Far from it."

Parisa Khosravi, senior vice president for CNN International Newsgathering, said in an internal memo forwarded to AFP that she had spoken with Nasr and "we have decided that she will be leaving the company. Nasr's departure comes exactly a month after veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas retired after coming under fire for controversial remarks about Israel.