Iran Irked by Errors in Qurans from China

Iranian publishers are complaining that cost-saving plans to print Qurans in China are yielding embarrassing results: A slew of typos.

The head of Iran's Quran oversight office says some of the Chinese-printed versions of Islam's holy book are littered with spelling errors.

Ahmad Haji-Sharif is quoted by Iran's semiofficial Mehr news agency as warning consumers that lower-cost Qurans may have mistakes in the holy verses. He noted earlier this week that Iranian-produced Qurans carry a higher price but have passed a careful inspection for any flaws.

Officials are now discussing a ban on Chinese-printed Qurans.

The Qurans that are in use in Iran often have both Farsi and the original Arabic.

Haji-Sharif didn't say whether the misspellings prevail in the Arabic or Farsi segments.