- Banned
- #1
U.S., ISRAEL & CANADA TAKE A WALK
By Louis Charbonneau and Arshad Mohammed
"UNITED NATIONS, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Iran's president said on Wednesday his country was under constant threat of military action from "uncivilized Zionists" and called for a new world order not dominated by Western powers in the service of "the devil."
In his eighth address to the U.N. General Assembly's annual gathering of world leaders, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad painted a gloomy picture of a world driven by greed rather than moral values.
"The current abysmal situation of the world and the bitter incidents of history are due mainly to the wrong management of the world and the self-proclaimed centers of power who have entrusted themselves to the devil," Ahmadinejad said, in what is expected to be his last address to the world body.
There was no reiteration of his comments to journalists in New York on Monday that Israel has no roots in the Middle East and would be "eliminated."
However, in a clear reference to Israel, he told the assembly: "Continued threat by the uncivilized Zionists to resort to military action against our great nation is a clear example of this bitter reality."
On Tuesday, in his address to the General Assembly, U.S. President Barack Obama warned Iran he would do what it takes to prevent it from getting nuclear arms and said there was not an unlimited time to solve the crisis via diplomacy.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is due to speak at the United Nations on Thursday, has hinted Israel could strike Iran's nuclear sites, and has criticized Obama's position that sanctions and diplomacy should be given more time to stop Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Without mentioning the United States by name, Ahmadinejad took aim at Washington's global dominance, asking: "Are we to believe that those who spend hundreds of millions of dollars on election campaigns have the interest of the people of the world at their hearts?"
Representatives of the United States, Canada and Israel chose not to be present in the U.N. auditorium for the speech, which coincided with Yom Kippur, one of the most important Jewish holidays.
Ahmadinejad, whose own second and final term in office ends next year, said authority should be used as a sacred gift, "not a chance to amass power and wealth."
Israel and the United States have refused to rule out the possibility of an armed strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, which the West suspects aim to produce atomic bombs but which Tehran says are for solely peaceful purposes.
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By refusing to hear Ahmadinejad speak,
the US, Israel and Canada
accomplished nothing of value
and succeeded only in calling attention
to the fact
that of almost all the nations of the world
they were the only nations
who were reported as not giving a leader of a fellow member of the UN
the courtesy of listening to his address.
