Iran leader's words 'sickening'

27oct05

EUROPEAN leaders have condemned statements by the Iranian President
calling for Israel to be destroyed.

Speaking in the Iranian capital Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said
Israel should be "wiped off the map", the official IRNA news agency
reported.

Support for the Palestinian cause is a central pillar of the Islamic
Republic which officially refuses to recognise Israel's right to
exist.

"Israel must be wiped off the map," Ahmadinejad told a conference
called "The World without Zionism", attended by some 3,000
conservative students who chanted "Death to Israel" and "Death 
to America".

Under reformist President Mohammad Khatami, whose eight-year tenure
ended earlier this year, Iran had shown signs of easing its implacable
hostility towards Israel. Officials said Tehran might not object to a
two-state solution if that was what the Palestinians wanted. 

But Ahmadinejad, a former member of the hardline Revolutionary Guards
and traditional religious conservative, said there could be no let-up
in its hostility to Israel.

"The Islamic world will not let its historic enemy live in its
heartland," he said.

White House Spokesman Scott McClellan said Washington took such
remarks seriously. "It underscores the concerns we have about Iran's
nuclear intentions," he said.

The United States accuses Iran of seeking nuclear arms, but Tehran
says it needs atomic fuel only for power stations. Iran has developed
ballistic missiles able to hit Israel.

France, Spain, Britain and Canada condemned the President's remarks
and the European trio said their foreign ministries would summon
Iranian envoys and demand an explanation.

"(These) comments are deeply disturbing and sickening," a British
Foreign Office spokesman said.

"We have seen in Israel today the horrible reality of the violence he
is praising," he said, referring to a Palestinian suicide bombing in
the Israeli town of Hadera that killed five people and wounded 30.

"Saying Iran wants to wipe Israel from the map will only heighten
concerns about Iran's nuclear ambitions ... We will be protesting to
the Iranian charge d'affaires," he said.

"If these (reported) comments are true, they are unacceptable. I
condemn them with the greatest firmness," French Foreign Minister
Douste-Blazy said.

"...Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos has expressed his
rejection in the most emphatic terms and has decided to urgently call
in the Iranian ambassador to ask him for an explanation," the Spanish
foreign ministry said.

Tehran denies accusations it trains and arms Palestinian militant
groups, saying it offers only moral support.

Canadian Foreign Minister Pierre Pettigrew said: "We cannot tolerate
comments of such hatred, such anti-Semitism, such intolerance. And
these comments are all the more troubling given that we know of Iran's
nuclear ambitions." 


Source: "The Advertiser" Adelaide
http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/
story_page/0,5936,17051351%255E1702,00.html

Cheers, Steve..

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