Was ‘avoiding’ hate diatribe enough?

A SPOKESPERSON for Foreign Affairs Minister Bob Carr claims Australian delegates were not in the room when Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei launched an anti-Israel tirade at the Non-Aligned Movement Summit in Tehran last week.

In a typical rant, Khamenei accused both Israel and the United States of carrying out torture and terror and Zionists of controlling the world’s media.

He charged Israel with killings, destroying the homes and farms of Palestinians, and arresting and torturing men, women and children.

“Even now, after 65 years, the same kind of crimes mark the treatment of Palestinians remaining in the Occupied territories by the blood-thirsty Zionist wolves,” he said. “They commit new crimes one after the other and create new crises for the region.”

Khamenei’s speech drew a rebuke from United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

“Claiming that another UN member state, Israel, does not have the right to exist, or describing it in racist terms, is not only utterly wrong but undermines the very principles we have all pledged to uphold,” Ban told the summit.

Australia’s decision to send the Prime Minister’s special envoy, Joanna Hewitt, and Ambassador to the United Nations Gary Quinlan to the summit attracted criticism amid concerns it would lend legitimacy to the Iranian regime and undermine sanctions aimed at halting its nuclear program.

Last week, a spokesperson for the Foreign Minister assured The AJN that Hewitt and Quinlan had been instructed to walk out in the event of an anti-Semitic rant.

But the spokesperson told The AJN this week that the representatives were not even in the room when Khamenei’s speech was made.

“Anti-Israel comments by the leaders of Iran are a disgrace and should be publicly withdrawn,” the spokesperson said. “It’s why we consciously avoided attending the speech, to make that point clear.

“We made the point – which the Iranians were aware of – that we weren’t going.

“We also didn’t attend the opening address by the Iranian Prime Minister.”

But shadow foreign affairs minister Julie Bishop reiterated that Hewitt and Quinlan should not have travelled to Tehran at all.

“It was inevitable that Iranian leaders would make derogatory and threatening remarks about Israel, as they have done repeatedly over many years,” she said.

“The excuse that our officials were not present in the room at the time of a provocative speech is unacceptable.

“These officials should not be at this summit and it was a mistake to send them.”

GARETH NARUNSKY

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.