US boycott rationale

(Thanks to Judith Gordon at Yale for the quote)

USUN PRESS RELEASE #074 April 20, 2009

[Q&A session following] Remarks by Ambassador Alejandro D. Wolff, after Consultations on the Middle East, at the Security Council Stakeout, April 20, 2009

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Reporter: Two things on Iran, Ambassador. One, what is the U.S. reaction to the speech given at the Durban II conference by President Ahmadinejad of Iran today and secondly, looking forward—going forward—how does the US plan to address in the Security Council context, the issue of the seized arms shipment by Cyprus allegedly bound from Iran to Syria?

Ambassador Wolff: Well as to President Ahmadinejad’s vile and hateful speech this morning, you saw a reaction in the room and you saw a very good reaction by the Secretary-General. This is—I can’t think of any other word than shameful, it’s inaccurate; it shows disregard for the organization to which he is speaking—the United Nations—and does a grave injustice to the Iranian nation and the Iranian people. And we call on the Iranian leadership to show much more measured, moderate, honest and constructive rhetoric when dealing with issues in the region and not this type of vile, hateful, (inaudible) speech that we all saw in the Ahmadinejad spectacle of this morning.

Reporter: (off mike) for the shipment?

Ambassador Wolff: That’s an issue that’s being dealt with by the relevant sanctions committee and continues to work on that issue.

Reporter: The high-level meeting

Ambassador Wolff: I can tell you what I know which is that the Russian government has proposed a ministerial meeting on the Middle East and is consulting with Council members on that as we speak.

Reporter: (crosstalk) in Geneva, do you think that maybe it was a better idea for America to join that conference in Geneva so that your voices would be heard better, seeing what happened like today? If you were there, you would have been able to speak more.

Ambassador Wolff: I’m not sure I understand the premise that whether the United States was there or not would have affected Ahmadinejad’s known views. The position the United States government has was taken articulated again by President Obama this weekend. We would have liked to have been there and we pushed hard. Our views and criteria were well know, they were announced on February 27. Some progress was made and we welcome that progress. On the other hand there were other aspects of the draft resolution coming out of that conference that we still have problems with related to the reaffirmation of the entire Durban I program of action and references to incitement of religion, of religious hatred, which the way it was drafted was tantamount to prohibitions on freedom of speech. So those concerns remain valid and I believe our position was the right one and again, have nothing to do with the spectacle you beheld this morning.