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Iran’s president does not consider his 9/11 comments insulting

25 September 2010 22:58 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Ä°ranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he does not consider insulting the comments about the 9/11 attacks he made at the UN General Assembly, and called for establishing a special tribunal to investigate into the 9/11 tragedy, APA reports quoting RIA Novosti.
Addressing the delegates from 192 nations the UN General Assembly on September 24, Ahmadinejad said some segments within the U.S. government were behind the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York.
A U.S. delegation walked out of the UN General Assembly hall during the speech from Ahmadinejad. "It was offensive. It was hateful," U.S. President Barack Obama said later.
Iran’s president described as ’naive’ the US government’s response to his comments.
"Have we really said something bad?... Does everybody who wants to express his opinion have to speak on the behalf of the U.S. government? We’ve just disclosed the root of the problem," the Iran’s ISNA news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying.
Answering to a question whether he could have ruffled the feelings of the New York residents, Ahmadinejad said he was just "defending their rights."
"If certain individuals are responsible for the September 11 incident, a fair and independent tribunal must probe the matter," the Iran’s president said.
"This is our legal right to ask for a truth-finding committee to investigate the incident," Ahmadinejad said.
"I did not give an opinion of my own, I suggested that a fact-finding group or mission should be formed to delve into the truth," Ahmadinejad said. "The fact-finding group can shed light on who the perpetrators were."
"Do you think the entire world has to accept what the U.S. government tells them? Or do you think perhaps a fact-finding mission is necessary to tell the world about the incident? The fact-finding group can shed light on who the perpetrators were," the Iran’s president in an interview on Friday.
"September 11 became a pretext for pressuring Middle Eastern nations and for violating their rights."
"You (American officials) caused the September 11 event and now you are accusing every nation that stands against you and seeks to maintain its independence of cooperating with terrorism," he said.
Four airliners were hijacked on September 11, 2001. Two planes crashed into the twin World Trade Center towers in Lower Manhattan. A short time later hijackers flew another plane into the Pentagon while the fourth crashed in rural Pennsylvania. In all, 2,975 were people killed.
In May this year, U.S., French and British delegations walked out of the UN General Assembly hall during Ahmadinejad’s speech when he accused Western powers of double standards concerning nuclear non-proliferation.