Eurasia Press & News
TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told the UN General Assembly Tuesday that a few “bullying” world powers are trying to thwart Iran’s peaceful nuclear program.
Ahmadinejad’s remarks were deemed as a response to the allegations of US President Bush who claimed in his address just a few hours earlier that Iran’s nuclear ambitions pose a threat to the world.
The Iranian President said Iran like other countries has an “inalienable” right to peaceful nuclear energy but said a few bullying world powers have tried to thwart Iran’s program through political and economic pressure.
“A few bullying powers have sought to put hurdles in the way of the peaceful nuclear activities of the Iranian nation by exerting political and economic pressures against Iran and also through threatening and pressuring the IAEA,” the UN nuclear watchdog.
“These are the same countries that are producing new generation of nuclear arms and no international organization is monitoring their program. The catastrophe in Nagasaki and Hiroshima was perpetrated by one of these powers,” Ahmadinejad added.
Ahmadinejad stressed that such powers are not against a proliferation of nuclear weapons but they want to monopolize advanced technologies to use them as a tool to impose their own will on others.
“It is natural that the great Iranian nation will resist the bullying powers and will continue to defend their nuclear rights,” remarked the president.
In his latest report to the IAEA’s 35-member Board of Governors, the UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei once again verified Iran’s non-diversion of declared nuclear material, adding that the UN agency has failed to discover any “components of a nuclear weapon” or “related nuclear physics studies” in Iran.
Ahmadinejad said his government has fully cooperated with IAEA inspectors, who he said should redirect their scrutiny to the world’s declared nuclear powers.
ElBaradei praised Iran’s cooperation and truthfulness about key aspects of its past nuclear activities in two of his recent reports – one in November and the other one in February.
The February report by the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, praised Iran’s cooperation in clearing up all of the past questions over its nuclear program, vindicating Iran’s nuclear program and leaving no justification for any new UN sanctions.
“The Iranian nation is for dialogue. But it has not accepted and will not accept illegal demands,” Ahmadinejad said.
He also urged the UN’s atomic watchdog agency to report on the nuclear weapons of the world powers.
“The time has come for the IAEA to present a clear report to the international community on its monitoring of the disarmament of the nuclear powers and their nuclear activities, and for a disarmament committee to be established by independent states to monitor the disarmament of these nuclear powers,” Ahmadinejad said.
He slammed some world powers that are stockpiling weapons of mass destruction including atomic weapons and also threatening the world peace by installing new missile systems.
Ahmadinejad was indirectly referring to the US plan to deploy new missile shield in Eastern Europe.
No senior US diplomats were present in the General Assembly hall for Ahmadinejad’s speech though the Iranian president and other officials attended President Bush’s speech earlier in the day.
Ahmadinejad sharply attacked the United States and NATO, accusing them of acting as aggressors in Iraq and Afghanistan, and of starting those wars “in order to win votes in elections.”
“American empire in the world is reaching the end of its road, and its next rulers must limit their interference to their own borders,” Ahmadinejad said.
He said that six years after Saddam Hussein’s regime was ousted in Iraq, “the occupiers are still there.”
“Iraq was attacked under the false pretext of uncovering weapons of mass destruction and overthrowing a dictator. The dictator is toppled and no such weapons were found in the country. A democratic government is established through election in Iraq but after six years the occupiers are still there and try to impose colonial agreements on the people of Iraq,” he explained.
“They have no respect for the people of Iraq and disregard the Iraqi nation’s dignity,” Ahmadinejad remarked.
“Millions have been killed or displaced, and the occupiers, without a sense of shame, are still seeking to solidify their position in the … region and to dominate oil resources,” Ahmadinejad said.
In Afghanistan, terrorism is spreading quickly and the presence of NATO forces has contributed to a huge increase in the production of narcotics, Ahmadinejad said.
Ahmadinejad also said that NATO ‘s “provocations” should be blamed for the August war in Georgia.
“The lives, properties and rights of the people of Georgia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia are victims of the tendencies and provocations of NATO and certain western powers and underhanded actions of the Zionists,” President Ahmadinejad said.
Also during his address to the UN, his fourth since taking office in 2005, Ahmadinejad stressed once again that the Zionist regime of Israel is on “a definite slope to collapse, and there is no way for it to get out of the cesspool created by itself and its supporters.”
He said that the Security Council is incapable of stopping atrocities against oppressed nations, and blasted the UNSC for smoothing the path for “Zionist murderers” under a pressure from certain powers.
“The Security Council cannot do anything and sometimes under the pressure from few bullying powers it even paves the way for supporting the Zionist murderers,” he said.
Pointing to Israeli atrocities against the Palestinian people for six decades, he said, “In Palestine 60 years of carnage and invasion is still ongoing at the hands of the occupant regime of Israel. They have forged a regime by gathering people from various parts of the world and by displacing and killing the true owners of the Palestinian land.”
During interviews ahead of his speech Tuesday, Ahmadinejad blamed US military interventions around the world in part for the collapse of global financial markets.
He said the campaign against his country’s nuclear program was solely due to the Bush administration “and a couple of their European friends.”
“The US government has made a series of mistakes in the past few decades,” Ahmadinejad said an interview with the Los Angeles Times. “The imposition on the US economy of the years of heavy military engagement and involvement around the world … the war in Iraq, for example. These are heavy costs imposed on the US economy.
“The world economy can no longer tolerate the budgetary deficit and the financial pressures occurring from markets here in the United States, and by the US government,” he added.
In a separate interview with National Public Radio, Ahmadinejad pointed to the vast international support for his position and said the campaign consisted “of only three or four countries, led by the United States and with a couple of their European friends.”
