Durban II draft confirms Zionism as racism: spokesman

@H=TEHRAN (IRNA) – Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi said on Wednesday the anti-racism conference in Geneva was in deed a confirmation of what was approved in the Durban I conference which had equated Zionism to racism.
Speaking in a question-and-answer meeting with students of the Razi University in the western province of Kermanshah, the spokesman said, the Durban II conference was a follow-up to a 2001 conference in Durban, South Africa.
Qashqavi said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech in Geneva has exactly echoed the items endorsed by the non-governmental organizations in Durban eight years ago.
The reason behind different reactions showed by certain participants of the conference to President Ahmadinejad’s speech was that “freedom of speech in the West is tolerated only to the extent that it has nothing to do with the Zionist regime,” he said.
He referred to the warm welcome given to the President’s speech by the world public opinion, especially in Muslim states, and said that was resulted from the President’s ‘public diplomacy’ in which he addresses the people not the politicians.
Qashqavi said that President Ahmadinejad’s public diplomacy was different from what is known as formal diplomacy which is based on holding official meetings with world politicians.