Students debate Ahmadinejad's arrival in front of Columbia University
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's interview with the CBS production 60 minutes was broadcast upon his arrival in New York on Sunday, which was met by protests and demonstrations.
"Well, you have to appreciate we don't need a nuclear bomb. We don't need that. What need do we have for a bomb?" Ahmadinejad said in the 60 Minutes interview taped in Iran on Thursday. "In political relations right now, the nuclear bomb is of no use. If it was useful, it would have prevented the downfall of the Soviet Union."
He also said "it's wrong to think that Iran and the US are walking toward war. Who says so? Why should we go to war? There is no war in the offing."
In the 60 Minutes interview, the interviewer said, "It is an established fact now that Iranian bombs and Iranian know-how are killing Americans in Iraq. You have American blood on your hands. Why?"
Ahmadinejad responded, "Well, this is what the American officials are saying. Again, American officials wherever around the world that they encounter a problem which they fail to resolve, instead of accepting that, they prefer to accuse others. I'm very sorry that because of the wrong decisions taken by American officials, Iraqi people are being killed and also American soldiers. It's very regrettable."
Meanwhile, the Iranian president's critics condemned him for denying the Holocaust, for threatening to "wipe Israel of the face of the map," and for trying to develop nuclear weapons in defiance of the United Nations. They also added to the list human rights abuses and funding terrorism targeted at killing Americans.
But that didn't stop the New York Times, whose editorial board reportedly has invited the Iranian President to lunch at the toney Four Seasons restaurant, correspondent Tom Gross reports.
"He should be arrested when he comes to Columbia University, not invited to speak for G-d's sake," state Assemblyman Dov Hikind said.
Some student groups slammed the university's decision to invite Ahmadinejad, rejecting the idea that the visit will provide a productive forum to discuss ideas.
"Here we take a tyrant like this and say, 'Sure, come. We understand that you continue your nuclear proliferation. We understand that you've denied the Holocaust. We understand that you want to obliterate Israel. But come. Let us give you an invitation to free speech," demonstrator Claire Meadow, a Columbia Law School graduate, said, Haaretz reported.
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