You are in:
- Archives » 2007 » September 2007
Iran New York Fallout Continues
Ahmadinejad: Mad, wicked or misunderstood?
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to New York continues to dominate the European and US papers. After his controversial turn at the Columbia University, the Iranian President gave a much more fiery speechat the United Nations, where he declared the issue of Iran's nuclear enrichment program "closed."
The Iranian President's speech came after an equally combative performance from France's Nicolas Sarkozy. The French President warned that "Allowing Iran to acquire nuclear weapons could destabilize the world and lead to war" and added, in an attack on appeasement; "Weakness and renunciation do not lead to peace. They lead to war."
Some commentators boggled at his bizarre claim that there were no homosexuals in Iran. Others pointed to his attempt to play down talk of war between his country and the US. Some argued that he might be bad, but George W Bush is worse.
So, is he mad, wicked or misunderstood?
For the Times, it's madness, but a version of "normal craziness" that the west has come to expect from the Iranian President. "Ahmadinejad’s relationship with reality is beyond repair", the newspaper's leader column reads,
"Mr Ahmadinejad is no more truthful on his nuclear plans than on homosexuality, women’s rights or the Holocaust, which he has called a myth. Even his claim to have a right to develop peaceful nuclear reactors is false: under the terms of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Iran has signed, it has forfeited that right by building the plant for highly enriched uranium production that has triggered two sets of UN sanctions in the past year. Neither set has had any significant effect. Iran has refused to cease its enrichment programme or accept the “intrusive inspections” that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is required to carry out in the circumstances."
David Blair, in the Telegraph Blogs, sees a similar culture clash. The Iranian leader has clearly never faced an audience so critical of his outlook before (though it must be added that criticism of the President within Iran, because of his economic failure, can sometimes be fierce).
"For the first time ever, Ahmadinejad experienced what leaders in liberal democracies face throughout their careers... Ahmadinejad was visibly dumbfounded." Blair argues that Ahmadinejad came out worse, and adds, darkly, that he is unlikely to be in a hurry to repeat the democratic experience.
The Independent is always good for a laugh, sorry, "alternative viewpoint." In its regular Big Question feature, it takes issue with much of what the rest of the world has been saying about the Iranian President:
"The president of Columbia University, Lee Bollinger, undermined his own case for freedom of speech in his insulting introduction in which he described the university's guest as exhibiting "all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator" and expressed the hope that Mr Ahmadinejad would not remain in office (...)
"Is he convincing on the nuclear issue? Yes, actually. He noted that Iran is within its rights under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. He argued that Iran needs to be self-reliant in producing its own nuclear fuel for energy because it had been let down by several western suppliers since the days of the Shah. He also pointed out that the UN inspectors have certified that Iran has not enriched uranium beyond the level of five per cent, which is the grade required to power a civilian reactor. Weapons grade uranium needs to be enriched to more than 90 per cent.
"Can we believe Iran when it denies wanting the bomb? Sadly not." (Though the diplomatic editor argues that the UN has been unable to "prove" wrongdoing).
Of course, some are gluttons for punishment. Andrew Sullivan draws our attention to advice by an organisation calling itself the "Columbia Gay Alliance", which warns students not to draw their own conclusions on the Iranian President's beliefs:
While the organisation condemns human rights violations in Iran,
"We stand in solidarity with our peers in Iran, but we do not presume to speak for them. We cannot possibly claim to understand the multiple and diverse experiences of living with same-sex desires in Iran. Our cultural values and experiences are distinct, but the stakes are one and the same: the essential human right to express our desires freely. Moreover, we would like to strongly caution media and campus organizations against the use of such words as "gay", "lesbian", or "homosexual" to describe people in Iran who engage in same-sex practices and feel same-sex desire. The construction of sexual orientation as a social and political identity and all of the vocabulary therein is a Western cultural idiom. As such, scholars of sexuality in the Middle East generally use the terms "same-sex practices" and "same-sex desire" in recognition of the inadequacy of Western terminology. President Ahmadinejad's presence on campus has provided an impetus for us all to examine a number of issues, but most relevant to our concerns are the complexities of how sexual identity is constructed and understood in different parts of the world."
As Sullivan says with understandable weariness, Ahmadinejad is right, there are no gays in Iran.
