By IRNA
Tehran : Iran’s Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in Geneva on Wednesday that the wrong policies of the US in Iraq claimed the lives of 600,000 people in that country.
According to the Information and Press Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mottaki made the remark in a UN-sponsored conference on disarmament in Geneva.
In the meeting, Mottaki reviewed regional and international developments.
Given the role of multi-lateralism in Iran’s foreign policy, he said, “This strategy help us to actively contribute in decision making at the international level.”
At the end of the Cold War some assumed that it was time for a uni-polar world and imagined that relevant grounds should be prepared to help a dominant power expand its policies and ideas, Mottaki said.
Based on this belief about six years ago they attacked Afghanistan and the same rule applied when targeting Iraq, he said adding that after six years there is no sign of security in Iraq or Afghanistan as pledged by the occupiers.
According to international statistics the wrong policies of the US claimed the lives of some 600,000 people in Iraq, he underlined.
Terrorism and occupation are two sides of the same coin and each justifies its presence for the other, he said.
“After five years of occupation of Iraq, the US called on Iran to hold talks with them on Iraq’s security and we did this,” he said.
Mottaki also gave a report on recent visit of Iranian president to Iraq and outlined its invaluable achievements for both countries national interests.
Outdated diplomacy cannot meet the demands of contemporary era, he said.
The UN-sponsored conference on disarmament should play its pivotal and effective role in restoring global security and spare no efforts to ban proliferation and use of nuclear weapons in the same way as chemical and microbiological weapons, he pointed out.
Iranian foreign minister responded to questions raised by the audience in a two-hour session.