EJP | News | Austria’s EU presidency condemns Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust statements

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Austria’s EU presidency condemns Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust statements

Updated: 12/Feb/2006 17:45

Austria's Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik, whose country chairs the EU, seen during a meeting in London with the other Mideast Quartet members, UN head Kofi Annan, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Russia's Foreign Minister Sergej Lawrow (left to right).

Photo: HOPI-MEDIA/ BERNHARD J. HOLZNER

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The Austrian presidency of the EU firmly condemned the repeated claim by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that the Holocaust is a "myth", in a news release Saturday.

Austrian foreign minister Ursula Plassnik described the hardline
conservative leader’s comments as "totally unacceptable" and "distressing".

"That such totally unacceptable statements are regularly repeated does not authorise us to accept them in silence," she said.

Ahmadinejad’s statement appeared "in complete contradiction of the efforts deployed ... by numerous political and religious leaders for a respectful dialogue between cultures," she added, referring to diplomatic measures prompted by reactions to European cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

Ahmadinejad repeated his view on Saturday that the Holocaust of Jews under Nazi Germany was a "myth" and argued that Palestinians and Iraqis were suffering from "the real Holocaust".

"Questioning the myth of the Holocaust and the creation of the phoney regime of Zionism has haunted them," the president said in a speech marking the 27th anniversary of Iran’s Islamic revolution.

"For more than 60 years, this myth has enabled the Zionists to blackmail the Western countries, justify the killing of women and children and make them refugees in occupied land," he said.

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"The real Holocaust is happening today in Palestine and Iraq. If you are looking for the real Holocaust, look at the poor Iraqi people," he said in the speech to huge crowds gathered in central Tehran.

Speaking out against the publication in Western newspapers of caricatures depicting the Prophet Mohammed, he said: "They are hostages to the Zionists."

"How come insulting the prophet is free, but investigating the Holocaust is banned," asked the president, who has already drawn Western condemnation for his questioning of the Holocaust and his call for Israel to be "wiped off the map".

"We suggested to them that we will send an unbiased group to look at your documents in Europe and inform the nation, but you will not even allow your own scholars to invesigate the Holocaust," Ahmadinejad said.

"This is the same way as you dealt with things in the dark ages."

Ahmadinejad went on to hail the victory in last month’s Palestinian
legislative elections of the Islamic militant group Hamas.

"The Zionists are on on the verge of being destroyed; the time of
occupation is coming to an end, so put an end to your slavery of Zionism," he said of the West.

"The recent elections in Palestine show what is inside the nation, so if
you want a solution to the Palestinian issue, let them say what they want to say in a referendum, the result of which you have seen so far," he said.