Iran accuses Israel of abusing U.N. interfaith meeting

Reuters

Published: November 13, 2008

By Patrick Worsnip
Iran's U.N. envoy on Thursday accused Israel of abusing a Saudi-sponsored U.N. interfaith conference for political purposes and suggested the Jewish state had no right to take part.
Speaking on the second day of the meeting, which earlier heard U.S. President George W. Bush call for worldwide religious freedom, Iran's U.N. Ambassador Mohammad Khazaee did not name Israel but left no doubt what country he had in mind.
"The representative of a regime (whose) short history is marked with ... aggression, occupation, assassination, state terrorism, and torture against the Palestinian people, under the pretext of a false interpretation of a divine religion, has tried to abuse this meeting for its narrow political purposes," he said.
Khazaee was referring to Israeli President Shimon Peres, who took the rare opportunity of being in the same room as Saudi King Abdullah on Wednesday to praise a Saudi peace initiative that he said had brought hope to the Middle East.

"The participation of such a regime not only has no benefit to our common purpose, but, as proved in this very meeting, will give them a chance to try to disrupt the current process divert our attention from our mandate" to improve dialogue between different religions, Khazaee said.  more ; also