Speaking at the first International Khorsheed Media Festival in Tehran on Monday, Raisi questioned the sincerity of Western advocacy for women’s rights and equality, citing numerous human rights violations.

The Westerners have occupied Palestine and oppressed its people for more than seven decades, and the US troops have been destroying houses and killing men and women in Afghanistan for 20 years, adding that over 35,000 disabled children live in the country today, Raisi said.

He stressed that the US’s two-decade-long presence in Afghanistan and the region has brought neither prosperity nor security.

Nowadays we are facing a media hegemony that misrepresents truth as false and false as truth, intending to shape public perception to suit its agenda, the President said.

They distort the truth or do not state it at all, he said, warning that such tactics pave the way for ‘modern barbarism’ to be imposed on societies.