By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Prosecutors launched a criminal investigation Monday of two Azerbaijani newspapers that published collages featuring the heads of Iran's spiritual leaders placed on the bodies of two dogs.
The collages appeared just weeks after a caricature published in an Iranian newspaper, depicting Azeris as cockroaches, sparked deadly riots among Azeris in Iran.
The images, published in the newspapers "Gun" and "New Fakt" last week, also prompted an official protest from the Iranian Embassy, which called them offensive and blamed the United States and Israel.
"Such a move serves the dirty intentions and unlawful goals of America and its Zionist allies and is intended to promote division between religions, faiths and ethnic groups, as well as in the unity of the Islamic world," the embassy said in a statement.