US officials, along with their British and French allies, made a very public point of storming out of the UN General Assembly today as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave a speech calling for nuclear disarmament and complaining about US threats to launch a nuclear strike against Iran.
Ahmadinejad reiterated his support for a third party enrichment deal, and complained that US threats for a nuclear first strike should be seen as a violation of the non-proliferation treaty (NPT). He also urged non-signatories to join the NPT.
In her own speech afterwards, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton angrily condemned Ahmadinejad for his “wild accusations,” and claimed that Iran status as a member of the NPT was itself putting the whole treaty in jeopardy.
Clinton’s claims are somewhat ironic, as the US threat to nuke Iran was made very publicly by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and others, while the claims about Iran’s “violations” of the NPT have never included even a shred of publicly released evidence.
