IRAN: The Iranian president, Seyed Mohamed Khatami, visited Paris this week to address Unesco and to see President Jacques Chirac. Before leaving for Pope John Paul II's funeral, he talked to three French journalists and The Irish Times in the Iranian embassy.
Mr Khatami said he did not think the US would attack Iran: "The American experience in Iraq has been very bitter.
"The fruit of US actions in Iraq is a bad image of America throughout the Muslim world. Young Americans are getting killed, for which we are sorry."
Logic and reason should prevent the US attacking Iran, Mr Khatami said. "Anyway, Iran is not like Afghanistan or Iraq . . . We hope the Americans will listen to the Europeans' advice.
"If the Americans attacked us, we would suffer, but the Americans would suffer even more."
He rejected allegations that Iran has used its influence over Shia Muslims in Iraq to create unrest there. "It is other people who are occupying Iraq who accuse us. If we must speak of interference, obviously those who occupy Iraq are the ones who are interfering."
Stability and security in Iraq are of paramount importance to Iran and the entire region, he said. "Consequentially, we will do everything we can to help a popular, democratic government rebuild Iraq. We are satisfied with the results of the elections."
As a result of the US-led occupation, he continued, "Iraq has become more than ever the centre of terrorist activities. Acts of terrorism and the taking of hostages are unacceptable in Islam."
The Iranian president twice repeated: "We condemn these acts is the strongest terms." He said the former prime minister of Lebanon Rafik Hariri was "one of my very close friends" and that he was deeply saddened by Hariri's death.
He blamed "a sort of movement that wants to sow disorder in Lebanon and drive the Lebanese communities apart." He and President Chirac agreed that their priority was for "a quiet, stable Lebanon, and that the democratic experience based on the co-existence of different religious communities continue".
The Lebanese Hizbullah movement was fostered by Iran in the wake of the 1982 Israeli invasion. Hizbullah is considered "the symbol of resistance, of the defence of Lebanese territorial integrity, throughout the Arab and Muslim world, and obviously within Lebanon," Mr Khatami said. "We have excellent relations with Hizbullah, but without intervening in their affairs."
Mr Khatami presented Syria's commitment to withdraw all of its troops and intelligence agents from Lebanon by the end of this month as something that "was supposed to happen anyway".
Though UN Security Council Resolution 1559 also demands the disarming of militias, Washington has, for the time being, grudgingly accepted it might upset Lebanon's fragile balance to go after Hizbullah.
"Fortunately, in our talks with him, President Chirac emphasised in a very precise way that France is not looking for the disarming of Hizbullah," he said.
Since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Iran and Syria are considered Israel's most serious adversaries. Under what conditions would the Islamic Republic recognise Israel?
Mr Khatami said it was a moral problem. "We believe that Israel came to exist through the occupation of territory that belonged to the Palestinians. Recognising Israel would mean confirming that occupation and the confiscation of land can give birth to legitimacy. We must oppose that."
But Iran would not object if the Palestinians made peace with Israel. "We respect the will of the Palestinians, even if we do not recognise Israel. We are not involved in the peace process.
"We will not interfere. But we believe that only a peace plan based on justice, which is not unilateral, and which recognises Palestinian rights, including the rights of millions of refugees to return, can come to fruition."
Iran has "no ambition whatsoever" of developing nuclear weapons, he said. Attempts to prevent Iran mastering the nuclear fuel cycle for its civil power programme aim to cripple its economic development, he alleged.
"The Americans are putting pressure on us and on the Europeans, but we do not expect this pressure to have any influence; we want everything to be done according to international law."
Though he personally deplored the imprisonment of political dissidents and journalists in Iran, he admitted that "perhaps in a certain number of cases, justice is not respected and the government has limitations."
But he pleaded for understanding for Iran's 26-year-old revolution, which followed thousands of years of dictatorship.
"Even if there are a certain number of things which happen that we don't agree with . . . what we cannot accept is the political exploitation of that by powers who violate human rights.
"Democracy is a process, not a project. We are going forward."