Iran: Diplomats walk out at Ahmadinejad's speech

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad today made headlines once more, when he referred to Israel as a “racist state” during a address at United Nations conference on racism in Geneva, Switzerland. Delegates from several European nations walked out of the conference in protest at Ahmadinejad's remark.

Jomhour has published the following video showing the diplomats’ departure:

Commentators have drawn parallels between this incident and the speech the Iranian president gave at Columbia University in New York in 2007.

Ghommar says Iranians have once again been humiliated in front of the world community their president. He writes [fa]:

رئیس‌جمهوری که در کشورش هر روزه شاهد نقض گسترده‌ی حقوق‌بشر هستیم …زنان از کوچک‌ترین حقوق انسانی که لباس پوشیدن است محروم هستند و در زندان‌های آن پر از زندانبان عقیدتی و سیاسی است..، خیلی خنده‌دار و تلخ است که در سازمان ملل از نژادپرستی و نقض حقوق‌بشر در کشورهای دیگر حرفی بزند

It is a very ridiculous and bitter thing that a president who in his own country witnesses a high number of human rights violations… where women are deprived of the most basic rights such as [choosing] their own clothes, and prisons are full of political and ideological prisoners… talks about racism and human rights violations of other UN countries.

Zarehbin says [fa] the scene where different delegates left the conference shows how much we are hated in the world. “What a poor nation we are that this bum [Ahmadinejad] is our president…while a regime repressed Bahai's and others in Iran how can support Palestanians’ rights.”

46 comments

  • According to the PLO & Arafat Palestine is a myth

    DESTROYING ISRAEL
    In March 1971 the Dutch newspaper Trouw published an interview with Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) executive committee member Zahir Muhsein. Here’s what he said. \The Palestinian people do not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel and for our Arab unity. In reality, today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people.

    \For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with de¬fined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Pales¬tinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beersheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will wait not even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.\

    Arafat himself made a very de¬finitive and unequivocal statement along these lines as late as 1993. It demonstrates conclusively that the Palestinian nationhood argument is the real strategic deception – one geared up to set up the destruction of Israel.

  • Rozita Ghotbi

    Hi Everybody

    My name is Rozita Ghotbi

    The telecommunications engineering professor of Elm-o-San’at university of Tehran

    I do think you all deserve to read the true translation of president Ahmadinejad’s speech at Geneva since i understood that the concept of some words has not been translated exactly in the way he talked.

    Here Is The Full Speech Of Ahmadinejad At Geneva:

    ————————————————

    \Mr. Chairman, honourable secretary general of the United Nations, honourable United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Ladies and gentleman:

    We have gathered in the follow-up to the Durban conference against racism and racial discrimination to work out practical mechanisms for our holy and humanitarian campaigns.

    Over the last centuries, humanity has gone through great sufferings and pains. In the Medieval Ages, thinkers and scientists were sentenced to death. It was then followed by a period of slavery and slave trade. Innocent people were taken captive in their millions and separated from their families and loved ones to be taken to Europe and America under the worst conditions. A dark period that also experienced occupation, lootings and massacres of innocent people.

    Many years passed by before nations rose up and fought for their liberty and freedom and they paid a high price for it. They lost millions of lives to expel the occupiers and establish independent and national governments. However, it did not take long before power grabbers imposed two wars in Europe which also plagued a part of Asia and Africa. Those horrific wars claimed about a hundred million lives and left behind massive devastation. Had lessons been learnt from the occupations, horrors and crimes of those wars, there would have been a ray of hope for the future.

    The victorious powers called themselves the conquerors of the world while ignoring or down treading upon rights of other nations by the imposition of oppressive laws and international arrangements.

    Ladies and gentlemen, let us take a look at the UN Security Council which is one of the legacies of World War I and World War II. What was the logic behind their granting themselves the veto right? How can such logic comply with humanitarian or spiritual values? Would it not be inconformity with the recognized principles of justice, equality before the law, love and human dignity? Would it not be discrimination, injustice, violations of human rights or humiliation of the majority of nations and countries?

    The council is the highest decision-making world body for safeguarding international peace and security. How can we expect the realization of justice and peace when discrimination is legalized and the origin of the law is dominated by coercion and force rather than by justice and the rights?

    Coercion and arrogance is the origin of oppression and wars. Although today many proponents of racism condemn racial discrimination in their words and their slogans, a number of powerful countries have been authorized to decide for other nations based on their own interests and at their own discretion and they can easily violate all laws and humanitarian values as they have done so.

    Following World War II, they resorted to military aggression to make an entire nation homeless under the pretext of Jewish suffering and they sent migrants from Europe, the United States and other parts of the world in order to establish a totally racist government in occupied Palestine. And, in fact, in compensation for the dire consequences of racism in Europe, they helped bring to power the most cruel and repressive racist regime in Palestine.

    The Security Council helped stabilize the occupying regime and supported it in the past 60 years giving them a free hand to commit all sorts of atrocities. It is all the more regrettable that a number of Western governments and the United States have committed themselves to defending those racist perpetrators of genocide while the awakened-conscience and free-minded people of the world condemn aggression, brutalities and the bombardment of civilians in Gaza. The supporters of Israel have always been either supportive or silent against the crimes.

    Dear friends, distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen. What are the root causes of the US attacks against Iraq or the invasion of Afghanistan?

    Was the motive behind the invasion of Iraq anything other than the arrogance of the then US administration and the mounting pressures on the part of the possessors of wealth and power to expand their sphere of influence seeking the interests of giant arms manufacturing companies affecting a noble culture with thousands of years of historical background, eliminating the potential and practical threats of Muslim countries against the Zionist regime or to control and plunder the energy resources of the Iraqi people?

    Why, indeed, almost a million people were killed and injured and a few more millions were displaced? Why, indeed, the Iraqi people have suffered enormous losses amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars? And why was billions of dollars imposed on the American people as the result of these military actions? Was not the military action against Iraq planned by the Zionists and their allies in the then US administration in complicity with the arms manufacturing countries and the possessors of wealth? Did the invasion of Afghanistan restore peace, security and economic wellbeing in the country?

    The United States and its allies not only have failed to contain the production of drugs in Afghanistan, but the cultivation of narcotics has multiplied in the course of their presence. The basic question is that what was the responsibility and the job of the then US administration and its allies?

    Did they represent the countries of the world? Have they been mandated by them? Have they been authorized by the people of the world to interfere in all parts of the globe, of course mostly in our region? Are not these measures a clear example of egocentrism, racism, discrimination or infringement upon the dignity and independence of nations?

    Ladies and gentlemen, who is responsible for the current global economic crisis? Where did the crisis start from? From Africa, Asia or from the United States in the first place then spreading across Europe and their allies?

    For a long time, they imposed inequitable economic regulations by their political power on the international economy. They imposed a financial and monetary system without a proper international oversight mechanism on nations and governments that played no role in repressive trends or policies. They have not even allowed their people to oversee or monitor their financial policies. They introduced all laws and regulations in defiance of all moral values only to protect the interests of the possessors of wealth and power.

    They further presented a definition for market economy and competition that denied many of the economic opportunities that could be available to other countries of the world. They even transferred their problems to others while the waves of crisis lashed back plaguing their economies with thousands of billions of dollars in budget deficit. And today, they are injecting hundreds of billions of dollars of cash from the pockets of their own people and other nations into the failing banks, companies and financial institutions making the situation more and more complicated for their economy and their people. They are simply thinking about maintaining power and wealth. They could not care any less about the people of the world and even their own people.

    Mr. President, Ladies and gentlemen, Racism is rooted in the lack of knowledge concerning the root of human existence as the selected creature of God. It is also the product of his deviation from the true path of human life and the obligations of mankind in the world of creation, failing to consciously worship God, not being able to think about the philosophy of life or the path to perfection that are the main ingredients of divine and humanitarian values which have restricted the horizon of human outlook making transient and limited interests, the yardstick for his action. That is why evil’s power took shape and expanded its realm of power while depriving others from enjoying equitable and just opportunities of development.

    The result has been the making of an unbridled racism that is posing the most serious threats against international peace and has hindered the way for building peaceful coexistence in the entire world. Undoubtedly, racism is the symbol of ignorance which has deep roots in history and it is, indeed, the sign of frustration in the development of human society.

    It is, therefore, crucially important to trace the manifestations of racism in situations or in societies where ignorance or lack of knowledge prevails. This increasing general awareness and understanding towards the philosophy of human existence is the principle struggle against such manifestations, and reveals the truth that human kind centers on the creation of the universe and the key to solving the problem of racism is a return to spiritual and moral values and finally the inclination to worship God Almighty.

    The international community must initiate collective moves to raise awareness in afflicted societies where ignorance of racism still prevails so as to bring to a halt the spread of these malicious manifestations.

    Dear Friends, today, the human community is facing a kind of racism which has tarnished the image of humanity in the beginning of the third millennium.

    World Zionism personifies racism that falsely resorts to religions and abuses religious sentiments to hide its hatred and ugly face. However, it is of great importance to bring into focus the political goals of some of the world powers and those who control huge economic resources and interests in the world. They mobilize all the resources including their economic and political influence and world media to render support in vain to the Zionist regime and to maliciously diminish the indignity and disgrace of this regime.

    This is not simply a question of ignorance and one cannot conclude these ugly phenomena through consular campaigns. Efforts must be made to put an end to the abuse by Zionists and their political and international supporters and in respect with the will and aspirations of nations. Governments must be encouraged and supported in their fights aimed at eradicating this barbaric racism and to move towards reform in current international mechanisms.

    There is no doubt that you are all aware of the conspiracies of some powers and Zionist circles against the goals and objectives of this conference. Unfortunately, there have been literatures and statements in support of Zionists and their crimes. And it is the responsibility of honorable representatives of nations to disclose these campaigns which run counter to humanitarian values and principles.

    It should be recognized that boycotting such a session as an outstanding international capacity is a true indication of supporting the blatant example of racism. In defending human rights, it is primarily important to defend the rights of all nations to participate equally in all important international decision making processes without the influence of certain world powers.

    And secondly, it is necessary to restructure the existing international organizations and their respective arrangements. Therefore this conference is a testing ground and the world public opinion today and tomorrow will judge our decisions and our actions.

    Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, the world is going through rapid fundamental changes. Power relations have become weak and fragile. The sound of cracks in the pillars of world systems can now be heard. Major political and economic structures are on the brink of collapse. Political and security crises are on the rise. The worsening crisis in the world economy for which there can be seen no bright prospect, demonstrates the rising tide of far-reaching global changes. I have repeatedly emphasized the need to change the wrong direction through which the world is being managed today and I have also warned of the dire consequences of any delay in this crucial responsibility.

    Now in this valuable event, I would like to announce to all leaders, thinkers and to all nations of the world present in this meeting and those who have a hunger for peace and economic well-being that the unjust economic management of the world is now at the end of the road. This deadlock was inevitable since the logic of this imposed management was oppressive.

    The logic of collective management of world affairs is based on noble aspirations which centers on human beings and the supremacy of the almighty God. Therefore it defies any policy or plan which goes against the influence of nations. The victory of right over wrong and the establishment of a just world system has been promised by the Almighty God and his messengers and it has been a shared goal of all human beings from different societies and generations in the course of history. Realization of such a future depends on the knowledge of creation and the belief of the faithful.

    The making of a global society is in fact the accomplishment of a noble goal held in the establishment of a common global system that will be run with the participation of all nations of the world in all major decision making processes and the definite root to this sublime goal.

    Scientific and technical capacities as well as communication technology have created a common and widespread understanding of the world society and has provided the necessary ground for a common system. Now it is upon all intellectuals, thinkers and policy makers in the world to carry out their historical responsibility with a firm belief in this definite root.

    I also want to lay emphasis on the fact that Western liberalism and capitalism has reached its end since it has failed to perceive the truth of the world and humans as they are.

    It has imposed its own goals and directions on human beings. There is no regard for human and divine values, justice, freedom, love and brotherhood and it has based living on intense competition, securing individual and cooperative material interest.

    Now we must learn from the past by initiating collective efforts in dealing with present challenges and in this connection, and as a closing remark, I wish to draw your kind attention to two important issues:

    Firstly, it is absolutely possible to improve the existing situation in the world. However it must be noted that this could be only achieved through the cooperation of all countries in order to get the best out of the existing capacities and resources in the world. My participation in this conference is because of my conviction to these important issues as well as to our common responsibility of defending the rights of nations vis-à-vis the sinister phenomena of racism and being with you, the thinkers of the world.

    Secondly, mindful of the inefficiency of the current international political, economic and security systems, it is necessary to focus on divine and humanitarian values by referring to the true definition of human beings based upon justice and respect for the rights of all people in all parts of the world and by acknowledging the past wrong doings in the past dominant management of the world, and to undertake collective measures to reform the existing structures.

    In this respect, it is crucially important to rapidly reform the structure of the Security Council, including the elimination of the discriminatory veto right and to change the current world financial and monetary systems.

    It is evident that lack of understanding of the urgency for change is equivalent to the much heavier costs of delay.

    Dear Friends, beware that to move in the direction of justice and human dignity is like a rapid flow in the current of a river. Let us not forget the essence of love and affection. The promised future of human beings is a great asset that may serve our purposes in keeping together to build a new world.

    In order to make the world a better place full of love and blessings, a world devoid of poverty and hatred, merging the increasing blessings of God Almighty and the righteous managing of the perfect human being, let us all join hands in friendship in the fulfillment of such a new world.
    I thank you Mr. President, Secretary General and all distinguished participants for having the patience to listen to me. Thank you very much. \

    ————————————————

    I am a citizen of Tehran and i’m totally against Ahmadinejad’s internal politics but the day before yesterday i was really proud of him while he was talking about some important issues such as the veto which is a shame for so called peacemaker organizations like the UN.
    Also i have to add as i think most of the things mr. Hamid Tehrani told are not true i.e. about what he said referring to mr. Karoobi \We Do Believe That The Holocaust Was Real\ – I have to add that mr. Karoobi’s words weren’t exactly what mr. Tehrani said : \We Think That A Murdering Issue Was Existed About Hitler And The Judes But It Was Not ‘The Holocaust’ And The Number Of The Victims Maybe Was Not Beyond 6000\
    The people like mr. Tehrani are traitor to the country and for sure more than 80% of Iranians (Who live in Iran and haven’t migrated abroad) are for mr. president Ahmadinejad’s =>internatinal politics<=.
    at the end i’m honored to say that i love judes as well as christians and muslims for they all believe in The God whether as the name Allah or Lord or etc but the Zionists do not believe in any God except the satan and i hope them to be punished for what they did to all free nations.

    Thanks
    Best Wishes
    Dr. Rozita Ghotbi – 22th April 09

    • 1-Concerning Mr.Karoubi’s comment on Holocaust that really existed I put here links in Persian from Iran based sites: http://rajanews.com/Detail.asp?id=27569
      http://www.lahzehnews.com/index.php?news=249

      He says “Holocaust happened.Numbers are not important, 6000 or 6 millions, but Holcaust really happened.”
      He used the word of Holocaust and different sources reported that. I hope you can read in Persian.

      2-I do not think people who live outside country our traitors. Ayatholah Khomenie, Leader of the Revolution, lived for years outside country and many others.

      3-Here I do NOT write my own opinion and any personal commentary. I cover Iranian blogosphere and here most of these bloggers are based in Iran and criticized Ahmadinejad. In another post I wrote about bloggers in Iran who supported Ahmadinejad. I call it a balance work.

  • ella

    Manuel Fox

    In the article you linked there is something you must have been missed
    “Both parties intend to challenge the decision in the Supreme Court.
    Members of the CEC conceded yesterday that the chance of the Supreme Court’s upholding the ban on both parties was slim.”
    If it was a racist country these parties would not be able to go to supreme court to challenge the decision and it would be certain that Supreme Court of the country would uphold decision.

    As for my “as far as I know” – it seems that not only I should write it but also you should, because the example above show that your own knowledge is not better than my own.

    MERC

    as a matter of fact you are wrong, the arab countries who attacked Israel in 1948, told palestinians that they would help them to destroy Israel and their immigration would be temporary. It became semi-permanent because the arab countries lost the war and palestinians started to live in refugee camps. None of arab countries gave them citizenship, allowed them to officially seek work in their countries , go to their schools, start businesses. Even palestinian refugees in Western countries got their citizenship there but not in their brother countries. In their brother countries palestinians are often treated like a sh***t and are only good for propaganda purposes that suit that country (or arab) policy
    Only Jordan is an exception.
    And you are saying that only one country is racist?

    Rozita Ghotbi

    It seems to me that what you put is an official version of Ahmadinejad speech. You must have missed his ad-lib insertions.

  • Dr. Rozita Ghotbi

    Hello Everybody

    1-Ayatollah Khomeini was vanished and he always said that how hard it was for him to be away of his own nation (just for mr. Tehrani’s notice for i don’t care about the man)

    2-I was graduated in a first class university of Germany (the cradle of electro telecommunications science) and they offered me thirty thousand euros per month for just the begining to stay and work there. but i didn’t accept and i came back to my beloved country and have been working hard for three thousand euros per month only, just in order to teach what i learned to my beloved students and now i’m proud of them since three of them had very important effects in launching THE OMID SATELLITE and now they earn three times more than i earn per month and i’m sure that the day will arrive that their students will earn same as the German or any developed country experts earn, here in my beloved Persia which i myself couldn’t.
    and i’m sure that my country is becoming a super power and a developed land in just a few years and we may show the people of the world the taste of love which i feel every morning when i wake up in recent years.

    3-The traitors who left the country doesn’t have any part in this, since they left for transient joys (if they thought that we had issues in Iran, they should have stayed here and helped to improve the situation for better which is happening now and i say that we do not need those traitors anymore)
    and one more thing about them, i think the US government stopped their salary for they started to clamor again such as mr. Tehrani and his humiliated colleagues who are working hard in various websites to bring firewoods for their own hell by betraying their own country.

    4-Mr. Tehrani can search the persian sites (for and against weblogs) again more precisely to find out what was i talking about when i told that more than eighty percent of Iranians suport mr. president Ahmadinejad’s international politics (but they also have a lot of criticisms to his internal politics)

    5-Most of the Iranian folks inhabited in europe and US are against mr. president Ahmadinejad’s internatinal policy despite the fact that more than eithy percent of Iranian residents are for that. I really don’t know why … but i think they are just gealous becuase they are not a part of us now as i said before and some of them are slaves of US government.

    6-Mr. karoobi had a conference at my university one year ago and in answer to the question of one of my students about ‘The Holocaust’ he gave us the opinion that i wrote in my previous comment and i do believe my ears more than mr. Tehrani’s false weblogs.

    7-I do not wear Islamic veil but that dosen’t mean that i am an unchaste lady and i do love my husband and my little girl.

    -about what is written in the top of the page :
    ‘where women are deprived of the most basic rights such as [choosing] their own clothes’ – I think i am free enough to choose my own clothes but if you mean by ‘to choose one’s own clothes’, being a whore, i’m really happy that this fake right is not available here just for the sake of my doughter’s soul (and also the other mothers’) and i really appreciate the goverment for that.

    -about the executions, i just can give everybody an exaple:
    In USA a man rape a respectful lady and kill her violently, but he just go to jail and after several years when he got out he does commits the very sin again and again.
    In Iran a man rape a respectful lady and kill her violently, then he will be executed and more respectful ladies will survive and his soul got cleared.
    so i thank again my govenment to save my little girl when she is grown-up and becomes one of the ‘more respectful ladies will survive’ and live her life in safty. as it’s written in the holy QUARN :

    ‘The wise human beings, in retaliate is your life if you could understand’

    Thanks
    Best Wishes
    Dr. Rozita Ghotbi – 22th April 09

  • ella

    Rozita Ghotbi

    You say that you do not wear Islamic Veil, but you do wear hijab don’t you? You just do not wear burka.
    I only wonder why with a hijab, with black dress covering the body Iran still have rapes and other crimes against women?
    Would that be because your men are taught that even women in veil are “asking for it”? Because they think that in reality all women are whores irregardless of what they are wearing?
    Otherwise why would you, in Islamic Republic of Iran, have these kind of crimes?

  • Pro-Israel supporters rally in Geneva
    UN Watch: ‘We turned travesty into triumph’

    The final two days of the Durban II conference in Geneva have been marked by a number of pro-Israel rallies attended by Jews and Christians determined to come away victorious this time from the second flawed UN gathering on racism.

    After Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called on Monday for “eradicating the Zionist state,” embarrassed UN officials decided to quickly pass without debate the final communiqué on Tuesday, two days earlier than expected, leaving many attendees with little else to do but take to the streets to voice support for their various causes.

    One such demonstration on Wednesday was organized by the American Jewish Committee and UN Watch, which brought victims of genocide from several past and present conflicts from Rwanda to Darfur to focus attention on the plight of victims who have often been ignored by the UN Human Rights Council, which organized the conference and has a slanted record of obsessively condemning Israel. The protest rally featured several prominent speakers, including Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, Prof. Alan Dershowitz of Harvard Law School, former Canadian justice minister Irwin Cotler, and former Soviet refusnik Natan Sharansky, who is expected to become the new head of the Jewish Agency.

    “Here, the struggle against racism means struggle against all the democracies of the world,” Sharansky told the JTA afterward. “And that’s very dangerous.”

    “As somebody who was present at Durban I,” Cotler said, “who witnessed the racism and hate and demonization of Israel and the Jewish people, all I can say when I look out here and see the crowd and see the flags, we have taken back the streets, we have taken back the narrative and we are speaking truth to power.”

    “We changed what could have been a tragic travesty into a triumph,” agreed former US Ambassador Alfred H. Moses, who heads UN Watch, in remarks to The Jerusalem Post.

    “It was a strong voice against the misuse of the conference” added Hansjorg Bishof, national director of the Swiss branch of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem. Speaking to ICEJ News today, Bishof estimated that at least half of the people who attended the rally were Christians.

    Veteran Hollywood actor Jon Voight, today a conservative Christian and human rights activist, was also on hand and spoke out against anti-Semitism at other pro-Israel rallies in Geneva. At a gathering hosted by Anne Bayefsky of Eye on the UN, Voight recalled Tolstoy’s wonderment at how the Jews have survived for centuries and Mark Twain’s praise of their accomplishments, as well his own appreciation of the Jewish gift of the Bible, which “gave perfect tools for living” and for peace, love and justice.

    Speaking before him, Eli Wiesel lamented the fact that anti-Semitism still flourishes. “The world has been able to cure many diseases, but anti-Semitism is a disease that still remains,” he said, according to an on-site report from the advocacy group StandWithUs.

    He defined anti-Semitism as hatred of Jews even before they are born, before they have developed identities or acted in ways that might explain the hatred. Ahmadinejad is one of those Jew haters, Wiesel insisted, asking, “Why would Ahmadinejad deny the Holocaust and claim that Jews ‘exaggerate their suffering’? What does Ahmadinejad know about Jewish suffering?”

    Wiesel charged that Ahmadinejad wants to enter the history of Islam as the first and only Islamic leader who succeeds in annihilating the Jews, and who outdoes Hitler.

  • MERC

    Space control to Ella, do refugees, any refugees, have a right of return? (If this is too difficult for you, just google the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.)

  • Rozita Ghotbi

    Ella

    Check this out:
    http://shahrzaad.wordpress.com/page/74/?referer=sphere_related_content%2F
    my own veil is kinda like that but more wifely.
    and you can also google the phrase: ‘iranian girls’ in pictures category.

    I have travelled to more than 15 countries and i found Iran, the only country which women can walk on it’s streets at nights (You can ask the folks who have been here) while some of the west countries’ children are playing with guns as toys.

    PS: I do believe that the number of cimes here, is a lot less than western countries.

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