Jakarta, NU Online
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejadhas expressed gratitude to the Indonesian government for its latest move in preventing the UN Security Council from issuing a French-initiated press statement denouncing the Iranian leader's statement on Israel, an Indonesian official said.
"President Ahmadinejad has expressed gratitude to the Indonesian government for its stand which shows a high level of independence and being the only country that opposed the French-initiated press statement so that the UN failed to issue it," the Indonesian president's special envoy for the Middle East, Alwi Shihab, said at the presidential office here Friday.<>
Iran's Fars news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during the commemoration of the 18th anniversary of the death of Iranian spiritual leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini on June 3 that "the countdown for the Zionist regime's (Israel's) collapse has started at the hands of Hezbollah's children - insya Allah (God willing), we will soon witness the collapse of this regime."
He was referring to the Iranian-backed, Lebanese Shiite militant movement which abducted two Israeli soldiers and killed three others in a July 12 cross-border raid, sparking a month-long war withIsrael. (tjp/dar)
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejadhas expressed gratitude to the Indonesian government for its latest move in preventing the UN Security Council from issuing a French-initiated press statement denouncing the Iranian leader's statement on Israel, an Indonesian official said.
"President Ahmadinejad has expressed gratitude to the Indonesian government for its stand which shows a high level of independence and being the only country that opposed the French-initiated press statement so that the UN failed to issue it," the Indonesian president's special envoy for the Middle East, Alwi Shihab, said at the presidential office here Friday.<>
Iran's Fars news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during the commemoration of the 18th anniversary of the death of Iranian spiritual leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini on June 3 that "the countdown for the Zionist regime's (Israel's) collapse has started at the hands of Hezbollah's children - insya Allah (God willing), we will soon witness the collapse of this regime."
He was referring to the Iranian-backed, Lebanese Shiite militant movement which abducted two Israeli soldiers and killed three others in a July 12 cross-border raid, sparking a month-long war withIsrael. (tjp/dar)
