DUBAI: Iran is expelling the bureau chief of Al Arabiya television after accusing the Saudi-owned satellite network of biased reporting, the station said on Tuesday.

The Dubai-based channel said Iranian authorities had ordered Hassan al-Fahs to leave the country. It gave no further details.

Last month Al Arabiya broadcast a report about plans for an Egyptian film called "Imam of Blood" that would criticise Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic.

It said Mohamed Hassan al-Alfi, a member of Egypt's ruling National Democratic Party, was writing a script for the movie which would argue that Khomeini's ideology was behind the 1981 assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.

Al Arabiya said the film was being made in retaliation for an Iranian film, "Assassination of a Pharaoh", which portrayed Sadat's assassination as the killing of a traitor by a martyr.

Egyptian police closed the offices of Iran's state-owned Arabic Al-Alam television in July, weeks after Egypt complained to Iran about the film on Sadat's assassination, on the ground that it did not have a broadcasting licence.

Mainly Sunni Muslim Egypt and Shi'ite Iran have not had full diplomatic relations since Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, when Iran cut ties after Sadat hosted the deposed pro-western Shah in Cairo.
Source : Reuters