United Nations Chief Ban Ki-moon used a speech in Tehran to criticize his Iranian hosts for denying the existence of the Holocaust and for hostile rhetoric toward Israel.
While Ban didn’t mention Iran by name in his speech at the Non-Aligned Summit, it was clear he was directing his comments at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has blasted Israel’s right to exist and denied the extermination of Jews by Nazi Germany.
“I strongly reject threats by any member state to destroy another or outrageous attempts to deny historical facts, such as the Holocaust,” Ban said. “Claiming that another U.N. member state, Israel, does not have the right to exist, or describing it in racist terms, is not only utterly wrong but undermines the very principles we have all pledged to uphold.”
According to Iranian media, Ahmadinejad recently called for unity among all human beings to remove the Zionist “black stain” from the human society.
“I urge all (Non-Aligned Movement) members to work within the principles of the U.N. Charter to resolve disputes peacefully,” Ban said. “But it is not sufficient to focus on lowering tensions between (Non-Aligned Movement) countries, as important as that is. We must prevent conflict between all U.N. member states.”
Much of the recent international attention on Iran has centered on the question of whether the country is developing a nuclear weapons program. In meetings with Iranian leaders at the summit, Ban reportedly told them the onus would be on them to prove their nuclear program is for energy usage, not weaponry.
In a speech at the summit, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei defended his country’s right to produce nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran considers the use of nuclear, chemical and similar weapons as a great and unforgivable sin,” Khamenei said.
“This does not mean forgoing our right to peaceful use of nuclear power and production of nuclear fuel,” he said. “On the basis of international laws, peaceful use of nuclear energy is a right of every country.”
In the course of defending his nation’s nuclear program, Khamenei attacked the United States.
“A bitter irony of our era is that the U.S. government, which possesses the largest and deadliest stockpiles of nuclear arms and other weapons of mass destruction and the only country guilty of its use, is today eager to carry the banner of opposition to nuclear proliferation,” he said.
United States and Israel had discouraged Ban from attending the summit in Iran, but he dismissed their concerns, saying it was an important opportunity to address the 120 members of the non-aligned nations.
The summit is scheduled to end Friday.
