Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s UN Address(es)
You’d be forgiven for thinking the former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would turn up to UN assemblies with a checklist of incendiary comments, or that he saw the occasion as a form of politically incorrect bingo where (unbeknownst to him) the prize was his nation’s political ostracism from the United Nations.
Every one of his eight addresses given from 2005 to 2016 caused controversy. But that given on September 22, 2011, must go down as the most controversial for the severity of its attacks on Israel and the West.
The first blow he struck was his implication that 9/11 was an inside job, orchestrated by the American government as a pretext to invade Afghanistan and Iraq. This understandably went down badly, especially given the timing of the speech just one day after the attack’s anniversary. It was made even worse when he proceeded to harangue the US for not bringing Osama bin Laden to justice, opting instead to execute him without trial and dispose of his corpse by chucking it into the sea.
Ahmadinejad’s next bombshells were his branding of all Israelis as “Zionists“, his criticism of how many western nations supported them, and his call for the creation of a self-governing independent Palestine, particularly incendiary given not just the context of the Israel-Palestine border but also contemporary Israeli sanctions against Iran and its nuclear programme.
Representatives from several countries walked out during the speech. US delegates took their leave when the president began questioning the official veracity of 9/11, while the two former imperialistic powers of Britain and France walked out when Ahmadinejad said that if the West were still compensating the Zionists for the Holocaust through the preservation of Israel, they also ought to pay reparations for slavery.
The speech’s brevity may well have been its saving grace. Had it lasted any longer than 30 minutes, it may well have prompted the walkout of every single member nation present at the assembly. Ahmadinejad’s record at the UN, however, suggests he might not have minded that much.