Iran angered by Canada’s UN initiative

Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Oct. 08 – Iran’s Minister of Justice and judiciary spokesman slated Canada on Friday for bringing up the issue of Tehran’s human rights violations and criticised Ottawa’s own human rights record. Iran Focus

Tehran, Iran, Oct. 08 – Iran’s Minister of Justice and judiciary spokesman slated Canada on Friday for bringing up the issue of Tehran’s human rights violations and criticised Ottawa’s own human rights record.

“Canada’s human rights file is dark and murky”, Jamal Karimi-Rad told the state-run ISNA news agency.

On Wednesday, Canadian Foreign Minister Pierre Pettigrew announced that Ottawa was tabling a resolution at the United Nations censuring Iran for its human rights violations.

“Iran has not lived up to its international human rights obligations and has not conformed with past U.N. resolutions on this matter. We believe this must change,” Pettigrew said.

“We condemn these actions on the part of Canada, the purpose of which are to blacken the image of this democratic state, and we warn them not to act in such a manner that their record in history becomes darker”, Karimi-Rad said.

“They saw that on the issue of nuclear energy they were unable to reach their desired outcome in the [International Atomic Energy Agency’s”> Board of Governors and have resorted to this new excuse”, the Justice Minister added.

“Whenever countries such as Canada and America and others are empty-handed, the only thing which they persist on is the human rights issue”, he said.

Canada sponsored two similar resolutions in the UN General Assembly over the 2003-2004 period.