Straw urges UN to support arms trade treaty
Foreign secretary Jack Straw urged the United Nations yesterday to support an arms trade treaty to help defeat international terrorism and political instability.
In a speech to the UN General Assembly in New York, Mr Straw said the London bombings in July that killed 52 people were proof that no nation was free from the threat of terror.
“The threat from terrorists and the political instability they bring is made worse by the easy availability of weapons in what has become an anarchic, unregulated trade,” he said.
“These same weapons fuelled the killings in Rwanda and Bosnia a decade ago and the conflicts in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Darfur today.”
Mr Straw dismissed extremists and “preachers of hate” who painted a polarised world of a “fundamentally different” West and Islamic nations.
He said the British government rejected the idea of a clash of civilisations and any “philosophy of mistrust and despair”.
Mr Straw also flagged up the work of the EU3 – UK, France and Germany – in seeking a diplomatic solution with Iran.
He said the EU envisaged “a high-level, long-term political and security framework” with Tehran.
Meanwhile, Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, told the UN General Assembly on Saturday that his country had an “inalienable right” to produce nuclear energy.
He insisted Islam precluded Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran reiterates its previously and repeatedly declared position that in accordance with our religious principles, pursuit of nuclear weapons is prohibited,” Mr Ahmadinejad said.
US president George Bush has described Iran as an “axis of evil” state, intent on gaining nuclear arms.
Earlier at the UN General Assembly, US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice accused Iran of undermining efforts to end the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
“Iran should return to negotiations with the EU3 and abandon forever its plans for a nuclear weapons capability,” she said.
“When diplomacy has been exhausted, the Security Council must become involved.”
Mr Straw said Mr Ahmadinejad’s speech had been “disappointing and unhelpful”.
