Meeting with the President of Love.
Finally, a short report on the meeting with H.E., the President Ahmadinejad of Iran. Him being labelled after Osama bin Laden as the most dangerous enemy of the USA, I have to say I was quite surprised when all UN interns (we are 270 or so in the fall) were invited for a "friendly meeting" with Ahmadinejad. After all, he is commonly being referred to as "terrorist", and even liberal newspapers in New York were comparing him with Hitler - no doubt because of his anti-Zionist leanings.So, there we went, to the glistening Manhattan breakfast room of Grand Hyatt hotel, to enjoy our free pastries, cakes and fruits and eventually to listen to the distinguished guests addressing us. Besides UN interns, there were also other (American) students who looked ridiculously young and asked somewhat silly questions during the discussion part. I'd estimate that we were around 400-500.
The event began with several hig-level people, Iranians or affiliated with Iran, speaking. There were university professors and ambassadors speaking before His Excellency stepped to the speakers' booth. I must say that although Ahmadinejad's smile gives me creeps, he spoke very eloquently. He didn't recite any Iranian poems as the other speakers did, but he mentioned the words 'peace', 'love' and 'youth' several times. Of course, he emphasized the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear project; stressed that they are not against all Israelis or Jewish people for that matter, only the Zionists; and instead of denying the existence of homosexuals in Iran, he just said that "people don't like them very much - but what everyone does inside four walls, is their own, private matter". I wouldn't say those statements differ that much from any other anti-US countries' opinions. In fact, great part of the world probably prefers Iran to the US - at least at the moment the Iranians are not trying to conquer the world as the Americans are doing.
Most of these political questions only appeared in our discussion part: we had 1,5 hours to ask questions straight from him (through an interpreter though), which in my mind was pretty generous. That, and the effort of organizing the whole meeting, was the thing which I was pondering most afterwards. Why did he do it? For the sake of good PR, of course, but why? Ahmadinejad met also with members of different religious groups on another occasion during his week in New York. He wouldn't really need to do that if he (or the actual deciding organs in Iran) was just going to blow up Israel. His motives confuse me. Anyway, his meeting was extremely successful, because I heard many people saying when they were leaving that they had changed their minds on Iran. I never had such a negative view in the first place, so I might not be the best example here. Maybe Ahmadinejad is the next Hitler as the media here is implying and I know that his speeches do not reflect his actions (as the worsening human rights situation in Iran). But he presented himself as courteous, welcoming and intelligent, attributes which could not be so easily attached to the current President of the USA, for example.
The end of the friendly meeting got a bit weird: due to overtime we are on already, the Ambassador of Iran promised that they would reimburse our lunch, no matter where we went to eat. Some of the interns apparently did do that and sent their receipts to the Embassy. Although we are not formally UN staff, I still felt that being a bit inappropriate. Actually, if we were UN staff, we should ask for permission at the Secretary-General's office...another thing we were "promised" was a trip to Iran, to go and see ourselves the country. I imagined that was more like a joke, but now they are at least talking about planning this trip - which also would be very inappropriate if paid by the Iranian state, considering that they are still grossly violating human rights there. Strange proposals, anyhow. I got an intriguing gift from Iran, because instead of having a photograph taken with President Ahmadinejad, I had to run to the bathroom and due to security reasons could not return to the meeting hall anymore. Iranian organizers were deeply sorry for me missing the photograph session (although I wasn't that much, I just needed to get my bag from the hall) and handed me a DVD of 'Nuclear Iran' in English that I still haven't had the time to watch. It will be interesting for sure...
Some of the things I remember best are his words directed to us, students all over the world. He described himself as "only a simple teacher" who was grateful to see us, full of hope and joy (!), wanting to learn more about thoughts and cultures and to discuss issues and find solutions. Ahmadinejad asked what we would do to help those one billion people living in extreme poverty (an excellent question for UN interns!), to help those 'many' (un-specified) countries living under occupation or the economic pressures in the world. Quote: "What would you do o resolve these problems, not to live in hostility, but to look at each other with kindness and love?".
When thinking of solutions to these problems, you can look for more information on President Ahmadinejad and his visit in the UN General Debate this September on the following (very biased) websites:
Transcript of his interview by Larry King: http://swyuda.wordpress.com/2008/09/24/larry-king-ahmadinejad/
CNN: http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/09/23/ahmadinejad.us/index.html
Webpage of the President of Iran: http://www.president.ir/en/
Ahmadinejad's personal site (not updated), this one with interesting interactive comments on the right side: http://www.ahmadinejad.ir
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