|
 WASHINGTON, Dec 8 (AFP) - Austrian
Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel on Thursday sharply
denounced hardline Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's
suggestion that Israel
be moved to Austria or Germany.
Schuessel, speaking to reporters after meeting
here with US President George W. Bush, called the remarks "an
outrageous gaffe, which I want to repudiate in the sharpest manner."
The chancellor also said that the resettlement of Jews was "no
solution" to the Middle East
conflict.
Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik also
called the Iranian leader's remarks "absolutely unacceptable."
"No doubt can be cast on the right of Israel
to exist," she said in a statement released late Thursday in Vienna.
Ahmadinejad, who in October said arch-enemy Israel "must be wiped off the
map", said that if Germany
and Austria believed
Jews were massacred during World War II, a state of Israel
should be established on their soil.
"You believe the Jews were oppressed, why should the
Palestinian Muslims have to pay the price?" he asked in an
interview with Iranian state television's Arabic-language satellite channel,
Al-Alam.
"You oppressed them, so give a part of Europe
to the Zionist regime so they can establish any government they want. We
would support it," he said, according to a transcript of his original
Farsi-language comments given to AFP.
"So, Germany and Austria, come and give one, two or any number of your
provinces to the Zionist regime so they can create a country there ... and
the problem will be solved at its root," he said.
|