Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, speaking at a review conference of the 1970 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty here, urged “the suspension of members in the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency which use or threaten to use nuclear weapons.”
“How can the United States be a member of the board of governors when it used nuclear weapons against Japan” and also used depleted uranium weapons in the war against Iraq, he added in a speech that triggered a walkout by delegates from nuclear-armed Britain, France and the United States.
Ahmadinejad also rejected allegations his country is developing nuclear weapons, citing “not a single credible proof.”
In the first day of the month-long conference, the Iranian leader dismissed allegations that his country’s uranium enrichment program is designed to produce a bomb, prompting the US and other nations to call for sanctions.
He invited US President Barack Obama to join a “humane movement” that would set a timetable for abolishing nuclear arms everywhere.
US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, scheduled to follow Ahmadinejad to the UN stage later, suggested over the weekend he was coming to New York “to divert attention and confuse the issue.”
“We’re not going to permit Iran to try to change the story from their failure to comply” with the NPT, she said on Sunday’s “Meet the Press” on NBC.