Hampton Court/Brussels, 28/10/2005 (Agence Europe) - After the unanimous condemnation, voiced by the Heads of State and Government of the European Union in Hampton Court on Thursday, for the words of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who said on Wednesday that the State of Israel should be "wiped from the face of the Earth" (EUROPE 9058), the British Prime Minister and President in exercise of the European Council, Tony Blair, stood firm against Teheran at the press conference closing the work of the informal Summit. "I have never come across a situation of the President of a country saying they want to wipe out another country", said Mr Blair, expressing his "revulsion" and "anger", continuing: “their attitude towards Israel, their attitude towards terrorism, their attitude on the nuclear weapons issue, it isn't acceptable". Can “you imagine a state like that, with an attitude like that, having a nuclear weapon?", he asked, going on to say that the United Kingdom would discuss the issue with its principal partners over the next few days. "If they continue down this path then people are going to believe that they are a real threat to our world security and stability", Mr Blair warned. The French President Jacques Chirac and Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Zapatero, speaking at Hampton Court, also spoke out against the "senseless and irresponsible" words of the Iranian President, which "brings with it the risk that Iran may be banished from the nations", said Mr Chirac. When asked about the possibility the excluding Iran from the UN, a measure called for by several Israeli leaders on Thursday, the president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, replied: "I am not going to make any concrete proposals today". The words of the Iranian President "contradict the assertion that it is a mature and responsible member of the international community", the Luxembourg Minister for foreign affairs, Jean Asselborn, pointed out.
It is also worth noting that Germany, Belgium, Spain, France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom have invited the diplomatic representatives of Iran to their respective capitals to discuss their protests.
Moscow, which opposed the idea of sending Iranian nuclear dossier to the UN Security Council at last September's meeting of the Council of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) (EUROPE 9033), has expressed its embarrassment. Condemning the words of the Iranian President, the Russian Minister for foreign affairs, Sergueï Lavrov, said on Thursday afternoon: " I cannot now fail to recognise that those who insisted that the Iranian nuclear dossier should be sent before the Security Council now have an additional argument". Shortly afterwards, Mr Lavrov added, however, that Russia's position on the issue of Iranian nuclear power had not changed.
Lastly, it is worth noting that at the headquarters of the IAEA in Vienna, several diplomats interviewed by AFP said that Mr Ahmadinejad's comments "would not help negotiations" on the Iranian nuclear dossier, but that they "would not necessarily lead to the dossier being sent before the Security Council".