Press TV
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has invited all peace-loving humans across the world to take steps toward promoting justice.
“The world today needs convergence. We need to construct a new world on the basis of friendship and mutual respect,” Ahmadinejad said in a Geneva meeting with Ramsey Clark, former US attorney general and winner of the 2008 UN Human Rights Award.
“It is not important where people are from, Palestinian or American or even Iranian. All of the peace-loving people of the world irrespective of their origin must join the cause of justice,” he continued.
Ahmadinejad, who had been in Geneva to address the UN-backed Durban Review Conference against racism, returned to a heart-warming welcome in Tehran on Tuesday.
Supporters of Israel in Europe and the US had reacted with dismay to remarks by Ahmadinejad at the conference on Monday; 23 European Union delegates walked out of the room in protest at his criticism of Israeli crimes.
Ahmadinejad criticized the officials, reminding the audience that they are the people who boast of carrying the mantle of ‘freedom of expression’ in the world today.
“Why is it that the so-called advocates of freedom of information fear hearing other people’s opinions?” the Iranian president asked.
Although his speech prompted a temporary walkout by certain delegates, the UN assembly hall received a rapturous applause from those delegations that had remained seated.
Clark told Ahmadinejad that logic dominated his speech and that many Americans would agree with his stance if they were allowed to judge for themselves.
Clark is among a handful of former US officials that have criticized Israel and White House support for the crimes perpetrated against the Palestinian nation.
“We’ve had 50 years of assault on Palestinian rights. I think they are the most terrorized… at least with the Iraqi people…. They’re the most terrorized people on earth… and have been for so many years,” he has said.
“Practically every Palestinian lives in constant harassment, threat of violence, humiliation
It’s been that way for a long long time.”
Pressures from the Zionist lobby in the United States have led to objections to the tone of the declaration set to be adopted by the five-day conference.
The United States and Israel walked out of the first UN racism conference in Durban in 2001 — a conference that condemned Israeli atrocities against Palestinians and sought to pass a resolution likening the philosophy of Zionism to racism.
Ahmadinejad responded on the issue that the global need for justice requires that all countries seek ‘change’, including the Israel-allied United States.