Iran determined to continue campaign against terrorism - UN envoy

United Nations, New York, Oct 11, IRNA - Iran's representative at the 6th (Legal) Committee of UN, condemning all types of terrorism, including state sponsored, here Thursday
stressed Iran's strong will to continue campaign against that
complicated phenomenon.

Es'haq Ale-Habib who was speaking at the annual session of that UN
committee meanwhile announced Tehran's readiness to cooperate with
other countries, particularly Iran's neighboring countries and the
concerned US bodies in that respect.

The Islamic Republic of Iran's representative added, "Effective
campaign against terrorism needs strong political will of the entire
countries and refraining from adopting double standard, or selective
encounters with terrorist groups."
He emphasized, "The collective campaign of the world countries against
terrorism needs to be supervised by the United Nations and the entire
international laws, particularly the humanistic international laws and
the human rights need to be respected in that campaign." Iran's
representative said that reaching agreement over a legal definition on
terrorism is a prerequisite for launching an effective campaign
against that phenomenon.

He meanwhile emphasized, "Such a definition needs to differentiate
between the terrorist moves on the one hand and the legitimate
liberation movements of the nations on the other hand, which are aimed
at achieving the right to decide their own fate and rid themselves of
the hegemony of the occupiers."
He meanwhile asked for the identification and elimination of the
entire root causes for terrorism, particularly occupation and
violation of other countries' territorial integrity, that is one of
the main factors that has provided a proper ground for the nurturing
and expansion of terrorism in sensitive regions of the world today.

Ale-Habib referred to the existence of threats due to the continuous
presence and activities of terrorist groups at Iran's neighboring
countries under the supportive umbrella of foreign forces.

The Iranian envoy elsewhere in his address criticized the conduct of
some big powers in their polices regarding terrorism, reiterating, "It
is a cause for serious concern that both the political sovereignty and
the geographical integrity of countries are easily violated resorting
to pursuing and launching attacks against terrorists, and in such
moves large numbers of innocent civilians are massacred." He meanwhile
referred to unprecedented growth of terrorist moves in the region in
recent years, attributing the sick trend to imposed enmities and wars
waged by countries coming from beyond the region.

The Iranian envoy said that continuation of negotiations in drafting a
comprehensive convention on campaign against terrorism is of extreme
importance, asking the entire involved parts to spend more efforts
aimed at finalizing that important document.

Drafting the text of a comprehensive convention for campaign against
terrorism was included in the UN agenda some eight years ago, but due
to the differences of opinion among some Western countries with
Islamic countries (and with many Non-Aligned Movement countries) the
definition for terrorism, and the insistence of some Western countries
for exemption of military forces' moves from inclusion in the
conventions, it has not been finalized yet.

In that respect, the representative of our country referred to Article
22 of the 4th Geneva Convention, in which it is stressed that the
terrorist moves of military forces in the course of armed encounters
are regarded as war crimes.

Ale-Habib demanded, "If same war crimes would be committed at times of
peace, too, they should be regarded as war crimes, and they should not
be exempted from inclusion in the category of war crimes described in
Geneva Convention."