Sunday, April 18, 2010

Iran Calls US "Atomic Criminal"

TEHRAN, April 17: Iran appealed on Saturday for “atomic criminal”, the United States, to be suspended from the UN nuclear watchdog at a disarmament conference it is hosting.

At the opening of the two-day meeting, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ruled out any use of atomic weaponry as “Haram” meaning banned under Islam.

Iran also called for changes to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, while Iraq, Lebanon and Syria voiced support for Tehran’s “peaceful” nuclear programme and demanded that Israel join the NPT “without conditions”.

Khamenei branded the United States an “atomic criminal” in a message read out by an aide at the nuclear disarmament conference, Tehran’s answer to a summit held in Washington earlier this week.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad went a step further and called for Washington’s suspension from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) along with all other nations which possess nuclear arms.

“Only the US government has committed an atomic crime,” said the message of the all-powerful Khamenei who formulates Tehran’s foreign policy, including its nuclear strategy.

“The world’s only atomic criminal lies and presents itself as being against nuclear weapons proliferation, while it has not taken any serious measures in this regard,” he said.

Ahmadinejad, under whose presidency Iran has defiantly pushed ahead with its controversial nuclear programme despite three sets of UN sanctions, attacked the present structure of the UN Security Council, the IAEA and the NPT.

“An independent international group which plans and oversees nuclear disarmament and prevents proliferation should be set up,” he told the conference attended by several foreign ministers and UN officials.

He said those countries which “possess, have used or threatened to use nuclear weapons should be suspended from the IAEA and its board of governors, especially the US”.

Ahmadinejad’s remark was expected to irk allies Russia and China.—AFP

Iran is no longer called a "rogue state" by US State Department by order of the Obama Administration which believes in conciliatory speech, which Iran sees as weakness.  Not a good thing.

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