On 29 June 2007, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati delivering Friday prayers over state run radio said he "hoped that the late Imam Khomeini's 1989 "fatwa" in sentencing the apostate writer to death will go in effect." He also spoke about the knighthood saying that "The result of such an act of Britain is its turning into of the world nations. These measures are the reason the US and Britain have become the most hated states in the world's developed camp." He also called on the people of Iraq and Lebanon "to be vigilant against the arrogant powers' divisive plots."