Iran Accuses Arab Royalty of Hypocrisy over Syria

August 16, 2012, The Hindu

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has rapped the Gulf Arab monarchies for seeking reforms in Syria without applying the same standards of openness for themselves.

Iran’s Press TV quoted Mr. Ahmadinejad as saying in Makkah on the sidelines of a summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) that he “was surprised in this summit [to see] that the kings of some countries were speaking against Syria while the majority of their own people do not want them [to rule].”

The Iranian President made the comment on Wednesday during a meeting with his Turkish counterpart Abdullah Gul. Rejecting double standards, Mr. Ahmadinejad said that he was “of course waiting to see when these reforms will reach the other countries in the region”.

During the conference, Mr. Ahmadinejad warned fellow Muslim countries in the 57-nation OIC not to fall in the trap that had been laid out for them by the region’s “enemies”.

“Today, all of us have entered into a plan without realising it; a plan that has been devised by the enemy. We are showing hostility toward each other without any clear reason and perhaps based on false information and under various personal, ethnic, historical, and even religious pretexts.”

He added that “media warfare has reached its climax” with the aim of sowing divisions among the countries of the region.

RADICAL COURSE

Mr. Ahmadinejad warned that without a self-conscious and radical course correction, the domination of Israel and its allies would swamp the entire region.

The Iranian side also slammed the summit’s decision to suspend Syria from the OIC. “Before making any decisions, Syria should have been invited to the summit to discuss and defend its position,” observed Ali Akbar Salehi, Iranian Foreign Minister.