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TEHRAN, Iran — Iranian authorities have banned the country's largest-circulation newspaper for publishing a photo of a Baha'i temple, state media reported Monday.

Iran's Shiite cleric-led regime views the Baha'i religion as heretical and has banned it since the 1979 revolution. The photo also gave Iran's leaders an opportunity to silence the Hamshahri daily, which mostly reports on social issues but which has been critical of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad's June re-election has been challenged by opposition activists and others who say massive fraud deprived the hard-line president's main pro-reform challenger of victory. Since then, the government has crushed street demonstrations, closed critical media outlets and silenced reformists with a mass trial.

Hamshahri was ordered closed by the Press Supervisory Board, a government agency run by hard-liners, for printing an advertisement containing a photo of a Baha'i temple that encourages tourists to visit the shrine, the official IRNA news agency reported.