WESTERN LEADERS responded with dismay to the outcome of Iran’s presidential election, and analysts suggest that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s disputed victory will make engagement with Tehran more difficult.
France and Germany condemned Iran’s post-electoral crackdown on protesters. Henri Guiano, a top adviser to French president Nicolas Sarkozy, told Europe 1 radio: “What is happening in Iran is not good news for anybody – not for the Iranians, nor for the stability and peace of the world.”
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany’s foreign minister, said: “The violent actions of the security forces against demon-
strators is not acceptable, nor is preventing peaceful protest.” Israeli leaders called for redoubled efforts to rein in Iran’s nuclear programme, and dismissed prospects for a diplomatic resolution. Foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman urged foreign leaders to “act uncompromisingly to prevent the country’s nuclearisation and to stymie its efforts to aid terror organisations”.
In a thinly veiled criticism of US president Barack Obama, Israel’s deputy prime minister Silvan Shalom said the result was a “slap in the face of those who believed Iran was built for real dialogue with the free world and would halt its nuclear programme”. – (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009)